Most of a nation on probation (GPS convicts)

[Ken Brown]

> I have never had a background check until after I was hired at my current job.  After I had been hired for a long time, suddenly they did background checks on everyone, though surely by then they knew everyone well enough to know that none of us were likely to run amuk and start shooting
> coworkers.
> 
> Suddenly background checks are in.  I do not know why.  Guess I should ask.

I think they are afraid of being sued if anyone anywhere in the USA
claims to have been hurt or inconvenienced or discriminated against due
to one of the company's products. "How can you say you are safe? You
employ KNOWN DRUG ABUSERS!"

At a previous employer of mine - a very large US  company -  checks for
drugs & so on came in about 5 years ago. Also, to intense bad publicity,
tests for HIV and other diseases (because of health insurance,
supposedly).  They didn't apply to existing employees except in safety
related jobs. Very much the flavour of the month, because of news
articles blaming drunk or drugged train drivers, machine operators & so
on for causing accidents. As our company has lost or killed maybe couple
of hundred people in industrial accidents in the previous decade or so
we were sensitive to it. Though why they wanted to extend it to workers
who didn't drive anything more lethal than a desk was beyond me. 

Here in the UK (things may be different in the US) it is probably easier
for someone with a criminal record to get a  job with government or
public bodies, or with charities and non-profit organisations,  than it
would be with a private company. Though of course it depends on the
nature of the record.

I doubt if  a 30 yearold record for hemp is going to lose anyone any job
at the moment in Britain.  It might even be a qualification fro getting
elected to Parliament. For about 6 months now prominent politicians have
been queuing up to "confess" to having smoked dope in their mis-spent
youths. 

Ken Brown