State Licensing Boards Stifle Entrepreneurs

Bradley Inman’s column, “Auditor Backs Regulatory Framework; Consumer Groups are Critical” (June 9), was very informative.

It is obvious to me that the licensing and regulation of 600 professional occupations by California’s state government is 600 too many. Harry Snyder of the Consumers Union recognizes that consumers are hurt by this restraint of trade, but he failed to note that individuals who want to break the cycle of poverty and go into business for themselves are also hurt by this elitism.

A good example is a black or Latino beautician, who knows how to style hair but who may not have had formal training and has not taken a written examination. This entrepreneur should be able to go into business without some licensing board in Sacramento having a say about it. The marketplace will decide. If the beautician is competent, she will have no trouble finding customers.

If a profession involves health and safety of some sort, such as a doctor or dentist, the public should realize that a title and a government license do not guarantee competence. A doctor could have graduated first in his or her class at Harvard Medical School, or last in his or her class at an obscure college in Kentucky, and no one would know. The best way to assure quality and safety is for some consumer group, such as Consumers Union or Common Cause to publish an analysis of the backgrounds and records of such professionals. The government shouldn’t have anything to do with it.

As a believer in limited government, I am appalled by the existence of such agencies as the Board of Guide Dogs for the Blind, the Board of Behavioral Science Examiners, the Hearing Aid Dispensers Examining Committee and the 597 others like them.

They may not cost taxpayers much as a portion of California’s bloated state budget, but the cost in terms of lost opportunities for small businesses and fewer options for overburdened consumers is incalculable. Only the Libertarian Party advocates the immediate abolition of all these agencies and boards. The current round of budget negotiations between the governor and the Legislature is the perfect time to implement such an important change.

TED BROWN

The writer is chairman of the Libertarian Party of Los Angeles County.