Does this legal monopoly status really protect you? Recently a dental hygienist in Payette, Idaho was convicted in Federal Court<\/a> for getting paid while misrepresenting herself as a dentist. Notice, no state prosecution, and the state Board of Dentistry only “pressured her” to \u00a0give up her hygienist license a year ago. Nowhere in this indictment is the question of quality of care addressed, just whether the provider actually had the legal license to do what she was doing, and charge for it. It begs the question of whether professional licensure actually serves the public welfare or instead regulates the marketplace. What do we want from government regulation of a profession?<\/p>\n The legislature washes its hands of that question by turning the administration of the professions over to, guess who, the professions themselves. The only governance over all these 50+ state-granted professional monopolies is given to the executive branch: the governor. That elected official appoints the board members who then regulate themselves. Or are supposed to. \u00a0Only through that office can we the voters have a voice if a profession abuses its monopoly.<\/p>\n Our elected governor is supposed to appoint people to each professional board with the public welfare in mind. If the appointees are only interested in protecting their own piece of the pie, the governor should see that and act. He hasn\u2019t been doing his job.\u00a0 And that is the joke Brad Little offered to a disinterested electorate May 19th<\/sup>. \u201cHey, no one\u2019s minding the store! I\u2019ll ask some bureaucrats to make your change!\u201d<\/p>\n Here\u2019s an example: In 2005 the Idaho legislature enacted licensing of naturopathic physicians. Governor Otter appointed a five member board. The board met and issued 11 licenses, then never functioned again, to govern themselves, to repeal or issue more licenses, but in fact sued each other and been sued, proving its inability to self-govern. And the executive branch didn\u2019t do squat. The legislature finally repealed the statute in 2015. How many other licensed professions out there are not functioning? The legislature can\u2019t make the governor do his job. But the voters can.<\/p>\n Pocket Medical License Card<\/p><\/div>\n Full disclosure, I answer to one of these professional boards. I am a licensed physician. I pay my annual fee to the Board, and they decide if I should get a license. I pay attention to their actions and applaud their efforts. I wish we could do more to improve the performance of our profession.<\/p>\n It\u2019s just an issue of who\u2019s in charge. And the joke is: it\u2019s us, the professional licensees and the voting public. We ought to wake up. It’s only fair to expect our elected executives to do their job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Democrats are getting their hair on fire about all of Trumps executive orders. Well, I\u2019m an Idaho Democrat so I\u2019m concerned with Idaho\u2019s Acting Governor\u2019s executive orders. My hair isn\u2019t burning, but I can see why the public isn\u2019t paying … Continue reading ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/danschmidtforsenate.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/IMG_0584-300x225.jpg\")
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