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title: Study: Drug Testing Boots African-American Employment
description: African-American employment increased between 7% and 30% in states with a high prevalence of drug testing.
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# Study: Drug Testing Boosts African-American Employment

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by 

[Bijan Stephen](https://time.com/author/bijan-stephen/)


## Bijan Stephen


May 18, 2014 8:33 PM UTC

by 

[Bijan Stephen](https://time.com/author/bijan-stephen/)


## Bijan Stephen


May 18, 2014 8:33 PM UTC

It’s no secret that America’s war on drugs hasn’t gone well, at least in [economic](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/04/business/in-rethinking-the-war-on-drugs-start-with-the-numbers.html?pagewanted=all&%5Fr=0) and [racial](http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/06/us/05cnd-disparities.html) terms. Labor economist Abigail Wozniak [investigated](http://www.nber.org/papers/w20095?%5Fga=1.242452226.1205361971.1397085400) the relationship between race, drug testing, and employment, publishing a paper in the National Bureau of Economic Research with her findings. Surprisingly, she found that the rise of drug testing actually _boosts_ African-American employment by a significant percentage: In states with a high prevalence of drug testing, African-American employment increased between 7% and 30%, while wages increased between 1.4 and 13%.

“A common assumption is that the rise of drug testing must have had negative consequences for black employment,” she writes. “However, the rise of employer drug testing may have benefited African-Americans by enabling non-using blacks to prove their status to employers.”

In case you missed it: She’s saying that, because African-Americans are perceived to use more drugs, drug testing enables them to objectively prove to employers that they don’t, which therefore results in increased employment. Here’s [Quartz](http://qz.com/210345/when-us-companies-drug-test-they-wind-up-hiring-more-black-people/):

---

> “”

---

Ugh.

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