[HN Gopher] Permission-Slip Culture Is Hurting America
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Permission-Slip Culture Is Hurting America
        
       Author : mhb
       Score  : 24 points
       Date   : 2023-02-25 19:45 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.theatlantic.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.theatlantic.com)
        
       | mindslight wrote:
       | Whenever I hear this argument, especially with its prominent
       | example of hair cutting, I can't help but think Chesterton's
       | fence. Isn't one of the main problems that hair salons are
       | avoiding is the spreading of lice and other bugs (that we now
       | take the non-existence of for granted)?
       | 
       | That doesn't excuse the high fees, red tape, zoning restrictions,
       | etc. But we should seek to reform those dynamics and make them
       | less onerous, rather than assuming that the lack of problems we
       | currently enjoy is reflective of the natural condition.
       | 
       | Personally I think that all costs for state licensing programs
       | should come out of the state's general budget rather than being
       | foisted onto those being required to get licenses. And passing a
       | straightforward test should suffice, rather than needing to
       | complete any particular education program.
        
       | puffoflogic wrote:
       | I've read several articles from the Atlantic in the past few days
       | which suggest it is a right-wing publication. (E.g., this one is
       | about reducing government size and citing the far-right IJ
       | organization.) This is odd because I hadn't really identified it
       | that way before. Anyone have info on why this sudden change?
        
         | ryukafalz wrote:
         | The Atlantic certainly doesn't read as right-wing to me. It
         | does seem however that there's been some more awareness on the
         | left lately of cases where too much red tape can hurt
         | progressive causes. This recent episode of The Ezra Klein Show
         | had a good perspective, I think:
         | 
         | https://nytimes.com/2023/02/07/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-ni...
        
         | trynewideas wrote:
         | Probably not related, but I didn't realize until a Wikipedia
         | glance[1] that Laurene Powell Jobs, Steve Jobs's widow, owns
         | _The Atlantic_. And that she was also an investor /board member
         | of Ozy and co-founder of a previous venture (College Track)
         | with its CEO, Carlos Watson, both of which have, uh, been in
         | the news lately.[2][3]
         | 
         | 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurene_Powell_Jobs
         | 
         | 2: https://thehill.com/homenews/media/3873431-ozy-media-head-
         | ca...
         | 
         | 3: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/23/business/carlos-watson-
         | oz...
        
         | peyton wrote:
         | I'm seeing recent featured articles titled "The GOP is just
         | obnoxious," "Republicans' 2024 magical thinking," and "The
         | humiliation of Kevin McCarthy."
         | 
         | The author of this article, Jerusalem Demsas, is a black woman
         | who writes about institutional failures and progressive issues
         | related to housing in Democrat-leaning cities.
         | 
         | What's your expectation?
        
       | throwawaysleep wrote:
       | > found that 88 percent of those professions were unlicensed in
       | at least one state, suggesting that the system is fairly
       | arbitrary.
       | 
       | One of the occupations under that is "teacher" per the report.
       | Another is "pharmacy technician." Another is "Emergency Medical
       | Technician." Another is "school bus driver."
        
         | dnissley wrote:
         | "Teacher" and "school bus driver" seem pretty unreasonable to
         | require licenses for because teachers also have degree
         | requirements and bus drivers also have special drivers license
         | requirements, making extra licenses rather redundant.
        
           | disjunct wrote:
           | In my state school bus drivers need to have a CDL and a state
           | certification for school buses. That same CDL allows you to
           | drive food trucks, garbage trucks, and long-haul cargo. The
           | major difference between those jobs and bus driving is
           | working with kids. That doesn't seem redundant to me.
           | 
           | Whether that should be done via a state cert or in job
           | training is another question, though.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2023-02-25 23:02 UTC)