moderate drug use and success

[Guest guest]

Kim - you asked for some references re " success " and moderate drug use. Take a

look at R. Kaestner, 1994, " New Estimate of Effect of Marijuana and Cocaine Use

on Wages, " Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 47, 3, 454-470. Also, same

author, 1998 Journal of Drug Issues article, 1997 Journal of Family Issues

article, 1991 Journal of Labor Economics article. The prevailing wisdom is that

even moderate drug use has a horrendous impact upon work efficiency, and hence

we have a 'no tolerance' policy under the Drug Free Workplace Act. Trouble is,

the data run counter to goverment policy. Using National Longitudinal Survey of

Yourth data, Kaestner found (quote) " large, positive, statistically significant

effects of illicit drug use on the wage, for both gender groups and for both

mariuana and cocaine. " (Don't misread this; the data is correlational, not

causal.) How is this sort of data to be interpreted. First, interpretation is

not easy, and the situation is surely multicausal. In part, we know drugs do

help short-term job performance (think of caffeine, for example). Is it really

so surprising that people might use cocaine moderately, in some circumstances,

to respond to extreme work demands (think of all those 16-hour a day Wall Street

brokers). Others might use marijuana off the job, as a relaxant. Again, that

such use correlates POSITIVELY with wages, despite the propaganda of the drug

war, seems intuitively obvious. Another part of the variance is surely just

increased effective demand; young people, that is, as they earn more, are able

to use some of their wage increase for recreational drugs. Anyway, the general

pattern of the data here are quite clear. Those who report more " moderate drug

use " also report higher, and not lower, wages. Drug use correlates with

" success " on the job, measure in income. All of this is culturally sensitive,

of course, and will change as the government focuses more and more upon

repression of, say, marijuana. What was " normative " in 1968 is now becoming

very deviant. Regarding another type of study, many researchers have simply

surveyed their college classes, asking about grades and drug use, then

correlating the results. Many of these articles end up summarized in places

like High Times, and you can acquire a bibliography easily enough, so I won't

bother to dig that stuff out and enter it here. (I think Peele discusses this,

and provides a reference or two). The results are consistent. Moderate use

correlates with higher GPA. Again, this changes as cultural norms change, and

as repression deepens. Don't misread my own intent - I am not interested in

being an advocate for or against drug use. The issue doesn't much interest me

(though I favor no government interference with moderate use of any drug.) What

I AM interested in is the government's use of the " drug " issue as a cover for

fascist policies of repression. Anyway, I hope the above is helpful.

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