Lennart Thornros <lenn...@thornros.com> wrote:
> In medieval times there were rules decided by people in a certain trade if > they would allow any new person to establish business in that trade. They > were supposed to be able to see the need for more resources. Guess what? > They made competition non-existent. > That is true. Such laws continued in force in the US up until the 1970s when most of them were abolished. For example, there were laws against advertising your services as a lawyer, and laws that forbid you from mentioning a competing product in an advertisement. These were abolished. Nowadays you see lawyers advertised on the sides of buses, and advertisements for soap no longer refer to "brand X." However, other rules originally set by guilds in medieval times are still in force, such as rules about stone masonry and building materials. If they were not enforced, buildings would collapse more often. > Today the licensing has ambition to protect the consumer. In reality it is > just no protection but plenty of job opportunity and income to government. > Government derives little money from licensing. In some cases not enough to cover the cost of implementing the licensing examinations and codes. > You say 'for good reasons' which reasons are those good one. That rules > has not changed and that we have laws that cannot be enforced as they > should have been eliminated 50 years ago is hardly a good reason. > Many laws have been changed and eliminated over the past 50 years, especially in the 1970s. However many other laws have been preserved. Anticompetitive laws and restraint of trade has been largely eliminated. The trucking industry, airlines, telecommunications and much else have been deregulated. This is why airfares are so cheap nowadays. There is a great deal more restrictions over pollution than there used to be. On the other hand, there is less control over drugs. You can now sell just about any quack cure with no inspection or certification whatever, and no control over what is in the pill, just by declaring it an "alternative" food additive or "herbal medicine" instead of a drug. This is why dangerous concoctions have flooded drugstores in recent years. > You have never been involved in the setting of industry standards I can > hear. > I have not, but as I mentioned my late father did this. He and others in government did the best they could under the circumstances. They were much better at it than you seem to think, and the people in industry they worked with appreciated their efforts. Also, I read about Herbert Hoover, who was the patron saint of industrial standards. He was no left wing revolutionary. He did not believe in an activist government, to say the least. - Jed
