Nearly 1 million people were not working because of opioid addiction in 2015, The Washington Post reports, citing new research that shows how drug use is having a profound effect on the U.S. economy.
A study from the American Action Forum finds 919,400 people between the ages of 25 to 54 were out of the workforce in 2015 because they were dependent on opioid drugs.
The loss of employees and their productivity due to opioid addiction cost the U.S. economy $702.1 billion, or just under $44 billion per year, between 1999 and 2015.
“It’s a pretty big drag on the U.S. economy,” says Ben Gitis, director of labor market policy at the American Action Forum, a right-leaning think tank.
The number of people who are not working because they are dependent on opioids has grown each year since 1999.
