Interest groups just love occupational licensing because it keeps down competition in their fields of work, whether it’s law, medicine, or anything else. Those who plead for licensing never come right out and say, “Let’s enact this because we want to stifle competition and restrict freedom of choice.” Instead, they concoct spurious public interest rationales to the effect that only licensing can protect consumers against incompetent practitioners.
In today’s WSJ, Institute for Justice attorney Clark Neily writes about a current licensing offensive, one being waged by interior designers. Read his piece here.
The shameless lobbyists for the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) have taken to using the absurd argument that it’s a matter of life and death that people only deal with licensed designers, dredging up cases such as the MGM Grand Hotel fire in Las Vegas many years ago and falsely claiming that the tragedy would have been averted if only licensed designers had been employed. Niely points out that the fire was so destructive due to an electrical fault and a poor sprinkler system, things that the interior design crowd has nothing to do with. But what the heck — if Hillary can say she came under sniper fire in Bosnia, why can’t lobbyists tell equal whoppers?
Astoundingly, these lobbying efforts have actually paid off in a few states. I wouldn’t be surprised if a licensing bill hasn’t been introduced in the NC General Assembly.
If individuals want to contract for design services with an ASID member, fine, but they shouldn’t have to. ASID is playing exactly the same despicable game as do so many other interest groups that want to use government power to force people to deal with them, thereby further reducing freedom of contract. Using government to help you get by force what you can’t get through persuasion is the cancer that’s eating out the innards of the United States.
