When opioid addicts count their losses, the numbers seem simple: One marriage. Two jobs. Custody of three children.
But when you measure the effects prescription drug dependence has on business, the math gets murkier.
You could start by multiplying daily wages by the number of times an addict calls in sick.
But how can you gauge what’s lost when an employee reports to work but cleans five fewer hotel rooms, makes 10 fewer sales calls or stocks 15 fewer shelves than normal?
Some researchers have tried, estimating lost productivity at $229 billion to $335 billion a year, according to the Indiana attorney general’s office. Those same studies found addicts are 33 percent less productive and 10 times more likely to miss work.
Liability is another issue.
An addict on an assembly line might neglect to tighten vital bolts. An addict in the operating room might administer too much anesthesia. And an addict driving a semi might trigger traffic fatalities.
Addicted workers are responsible for 40 percent of all industrial fatalities and are five times more likely to injure themselves or others on the job, according to data from the Indiana attorney general’s office.
Despite those serious liability and productivity issues, many employers aren’t in a hurry to fire workers addicted to opioids.
It’s typically less expensive, they say, to help an experienced employee get clean than to get a new hire up to speed.