Protection racket
That’s what a lot of licensing is and I say that as someone with a few licenses. NASCLA recently helped the police conduct a sting going after unlicensed contractors. NASCLA being a national association for licensed contractors, of course.
September 21st, 2012 at 1:04 am
In some of the “Business Administration” courses I had to take in undergrad at UT, we would have to discuss methods of keeping costs down OTHER than taking advantage of economies of scale or negotiating a better price as the professors in those classes had decided that teaching us to cheat was a better use of our time.
We would discuss various unethical and anti-competitive strategies such as purposefully reducing quality for planned obsolescence, adding filler to products, cheap ways to trick employees into thinking they were getting a better deal while you screwed them, of course, Lobbying to set up barriers to market entry.
I watched as students would shift their ideas about fair dealing and justice and agree with these tactics. They would then start coming up with ideas so much further out there that the professors would begin looking uncomfortable–Dr. Frankensteins appalled by the monsters they had created.
These schemes don’t just resemble protection rackets, they are ever more consciously created and strengthened as such. Unless something changes the minds of these classmates I had, and the others being churned out of other universities, as Kevin likes to say, we have rough history coming.
September 21st, 2012 at 7:03 am
The relevant citation for Nakoula Nakoula’s continued existence is 1952 Jos Burstyn Inc vs Wilson. In that case, the charge brought was that a film was made without a license. And that is the case Hollywood is arguing now. Licensed film makers do not offend Islam.
September 21st, 2012 at 1:01 pm
My experience has often been that the more licensure required, the easier the job actually is. I worked as a property appraiser. The only thing you really need to know is how to search for sold properties in MLS, how to use a measuring tape, how to operate a camera, and how to fill out the forms properly.
In the counties I worked in, you could tell me when you bought your house and how much you paid and I could tell you what it was worth sight unseen. I knew the % +/- price fluctuations for the area. Information easily found.
By the time I left that line of work, I used a Palm Pilot (remember those?) into which I put the measurements and sketch of the house. When I synced it to my computer, it put everything in the right place on the form and the program automatically pulled comps for me to choose from. A little tweaking of the boilerplate text describing the neighborhood and I was done.
You could learn all this in about two weeks, a month tops.
BUT, you have to have a 2500 hours of “training”! Just for your license to appraise residential properties valued under 1 million dollars. Another 2500 for your “certification” to appraise over 1 million. Then ANOTHER 2500 hours for your commercial license. And guess who gets to determine whether or not you get your hours? That’s right. Your future competitors.
So, if you can put up with three or four years of getting paid like crap and working 12-14 hour days, you’ve “paid your dues” and can now screw someone else into working long hours for short pay! Yay you!