Charles Pendleton, JD, CPP, Consultant
In 1982 the Employment and Productivity Sub-Committee of the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources held a series of four hearings on United State's productivity performance. Testimony was heard from witnesses representing education, science, industry, high technology, labor and government. During those hearings, information surfaced that was serious enough to warrant holding a fifth hearing. Seventy bit lion dollars down the drain. Think about it. According to the Sub-Committee's findings, seventy billion dollars is how much money American business loses annually because of alcohol and drug abuse by employees. Not possible? Consider---A business climate with decreased productivity, unmet quotas, absenteeism, tardiness, and couple that with an increase in security problems, accidents on the job, and destruction and theft of company property. Get the picture? It doesn"t take a computer analyst. from California, or a financial expert on Wall Street to spell it out for you. Pot., pills, powders and booze...sapping the strength and drive of America's work force. These impaired workers function at slightly more than half their normal capacity. With three million alcoholics in the United States and up to fifty-three million people using drugs occasionally, we are looking at almost sixty million workers performing at significantly less than their normal capacity daily.