George Will’s Townhall.com column describes some of the more inane efforts to impose cartels at the state level:
In New Mexico, anyone can work as an interior designer. But it is a crime, punishable by a fine of up to $1,000 and up to a year in prison, to list yourself on the Internet or in the Yellow Pages as, or to otherwise call yourself, an “interior designer” without being certified as such. Those who favor this censoring of truthful commercial speech are a private group that controls, using an exam administered by a private national organization, access to that title. This is done in the name of “professionalization,” but it really amounts to cartelization. Persons in the business limit access by others — competitors — to full participation in the business. …in Las Vegas, where almost nothing is illegal, it is illegal — unless you are licensed, or employed by someone licensed — to move, in the role of an interior designer, any piece of furniture, such as an armoire, more than 69 inches tall. A Nevada bureaucrat says that “placement of furniture” is an aspect of “space planning” and therefore is regulated — restricted to a “registered interior designer.” Placing furniture without a license? Heaven forfend.
Will notes — quite accurately — that businesses are in favor of regulation when it means they can raise prices on consumers and/or disadvantage competitors. This is why there is a big difference between being pro-market and pro-business:
It is not true that businesses, as a matter of principle, want to fend off government regulation. Businesses have a metabolic urge to make money, which is as it should be. But when a compliant government gives them the opportunity to use government regulations to enhance their moneymaking, businesses’ metabolic urge will overpower any principles about the virtues of free (from government intervention) enterprise.
