The Employment Prospects of Scottish and English Drug Abusers

In this paper the employment of Scottish and English self-reporting drug users is considered using data drawn from the Scottish and British Crime Surveys. Univariate and bivariate estimates of the probability of being employed reveal a robustly negative and statistically significant association between a number of measures of drug use and current employment. These results hold for separate samples of Scottish and English respondents, and confirm recent findings for the United States. We also highlight the paucity of data available for this type of research, particularly for Scotland, and suggest that this ought to be a serious concern for policy makers charged with implementing and monitoring polices aimed at tackling drugs misuse and its cost to society.