Tag: licensing

The AB5 Agenda

nanny state, freelancers, independent contractor, licensing, labor unions, regulations, general freedom

AB5 is the code name for legislation passed in California a few years ago to kill freelance work.

Ex-freelancers hate AB5; employers who can’t afford to convert contractors into regular employees hate AB5.

Unions, on the other hand, love AB5; lawmakers also love AB5.

A California citizen initiative partly reversed it. Then the Ninth Circuit at least temporarily reversed the reversal.

Though Democrats have made several attempts to bring it to the federal level, Congress has not passed a federal version of AB5. But now the Department of Labor is acting to impose a rule to challenge the status of many independent contractors, scheduled to take effect March 11. This AB5-like rule enunciates six criteria determining whether contract work may still be called contract work.

This affects what I do. One of my dozen jobs is citizen-initiative work. Various state governments have done all they can apart from comprehensive AB5-like rules to impede my ability to collaborate with petitioners to get citizen initiatives on the ballot. It is most efficient to pay these contractors per thing they do instead of earning a fixed salary or getting paid an hourly wage.

Politicians and bureaucrats know this.

If the Labor Department’s new rule takes effect, will contractors working with me pass the test? Or will we all be thrown into chaos and confusion?

It is being challenged in court.

Many voters — who are, after all, wage-earners or salaried employees — may not care very much; it may seem irrelevant to them. But it is time for them to inquire why some politicians and union bosses want to destroy the ability of freelancers to freely work for outfits short of becoming full-time employees.

For the ramifications will reach far beyond my niche “industry.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment too much government

DeKalb Gas Stations DeKneecapped

Post author By Redactor
Post date November 14, 2023
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The gas stations of DeKalb County, Georgia, never did nothing to nobody . . . except provide petrol.

Yet, thanks to a draconian county ordinance, the stations can be shut down if they fail to splurge on expensive new video surveillance systems. Even if they already have security cameras. Which most do.

The law requires the systems to operate continuously; to include cameras at registers, gas pumps, parking areas, as well as entry and exit points; to record at least 24 frames per second; to store recordings for at least 60 days.

Wait, these are private gas stations.

By what right does the county mandate precisely what detailed security measures business owners must take in order to keep their licenses? This is government turning the tables, rather than keeping these stations safe, the county lords the license over them, demanding the stations spend lavishly on security.

Arguably, the county is acting as yet another disruption plaguing the stations — which already face more than enough criminal invasion of their premises.

The law requires recordings to “be made available to any peace officer for viewing no later than 72 hours after being requested.” Nothing about obtaining a warrant if and when an owner is less than eager to cooperate. (Assuming, generously, that the video would be used to prosecute the robber even if the police and prosecutors had it.)

Lawyers for the Institute for Justice have been talking to the gas station owners, and have sent a letter citing the Fourth Amendment as grounds for DeKalb’s commissioners to drop this “beyond creepy and dystopian” practice.

Let’s hope the outcome is not more suffering businesses but a more limited government.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags licensing, police, surveillance

local leaders political challengers

Outlawed But Unmoved

He plied his trade without shame. Through the years, he was again and again officially rebuked for his conduct. He went ahead full throttle anyway, laughing in the face of danger.

Once, enforcers even tossed him in jail for a night to deter him from his dastardly deeds, deeds that were so galling and offensive to . . . well, to competitors in the same business who had decades of regulatory tyranny on their side.

On the Liberty website, Bruce Ramsey recalls the story. Born Michael Patrick Shanks, Mike officially changed his name to Mike the Mover.

Why? For the advertising value.

Maybe also the annoyance value.

His job was helping people move. Illegal, because the state of Washington doled out a strictly limited number of professional licenses. And for half a century it was virtually impossible to get one.

“Mike had started in 1981 with one truck,” says Ramsey. “When he painted his name on his trucks his competitors noticed him and complained. In 1987 the state cited him. In 1992 it hit him with a cease-and-desist order. In 1993 it slapped him with a court injunction. . . . He ignored them all. [State] enforcers wrote 89 tickets, each a gross misdemeanor, for operating without a license.”

Where Mike the Mover led, others followed. Finally, the regulators eased up and began licensing many more people to move for a living.

Not Mike the Mover. When he was finally offered a license, “I told them to shove it.”

Thanks, Mike.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment folly general freedom too much government

Ian and the Scurvy Knave

Florida, Texas, roofer, licensing, hurricane

Don’t help people after a hurricane!

Not if you live in another state and there’s no time to lose but . . . you’re licensed only in that other state.

Now, before you declare Houston-based Terence Duque an innocent victim because he was arrested for not being Florida-licensed, let’s take a cold hard look at the facts. Duque is licensed in Texas, has operated a successful roofing business since 2008, is rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau, is called a “preferred contractor” by Owens Corning.

Sounds okay, right?

But hold on. After Hurricane Ian smashed Florida a few weeks ago, what did this scurvy knave do?

Shamelessly and with constructive purposes aforethought, Duque offered his services to residents of hard-hit Charlotte County, Florida!!!! No, seriously. Simply because homeowners had had their roofs ripped up, Duque offered to repair them!!!!! Yet this man calls himself a roofer!!!!!!!!!

Arrested by the Charlotte County sheriff, who says “I will not allow unlicensed contractors to further victimize [sic]” hurricane victims, Duque is charged with “conducting business in Charlotte County without a Florida license.” He faces one to five years in jail.

He says he thought he’d been allowed to help Floridians because licensing regulations had been loosened due to the emergency.

No.

Justin Pearson, an attorney with Institute for Justice, says Duque was punished for “doing the right thing.”

The right thing??? The man was honestly trying to help people recover from a terrible personal setback and fully qualified to do so!!!!!!! Look at the facts!!!!!!!!!

Throw away the key?

This is, er, Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Fifth Amendment rights First Amendment rights Fourth Amendment rights general freedom

Three Decades of Justice

Since September 1991, the libertarian law firm founded by Chip Mellor and Clint Bolick has been fighting for the rights of its clients against governmental assault.

For no charge, Institute for Justice helps people stripped of options fight for:

● The right to keep one’s land (and what’s on it).

In 2001, the city of Mesa, Arizona launched eminent-domain proceedings against Bailey’s Brake Service, owned by Randy Bailey. The plan was to destroy the shop and give the land to a hardware store, not a constitutionally permitted “public use.” Bailey and IJ eventually prevailed in court.

● The right to make a living despite arbitrary professional licensing.

The Louisiana State Board of Cosmetology demands that aspiring hair braiders submit to hundreds of hours of training and pay for an expensive license to ply their trade. IJ is challenging the requirement on behalf of clients Ashley N’Dakpri, Lynn Schofield, and Michelle Robertson.

● The right to keep one’s cash despite arbitrary civil forfeiture — i.e., the power of police and prosecutors to grab your money or other belongings without charging you with a crime.

One recent victim is Marine Corps veteran Stephen Laura, whose $86,900 was looted by the Nevada Highway Patrol. The Institute has agreed to help him get it back.

And so on.

It doesn’t look like governments will stop interfering with our ability to live and work any time soon.

“Eternal Vigilance”? Thy name is IJ.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags civil asset forfeiture, Institute for Justice, law, licensing

insider corruption too much government

Engineering Government Limits

Post author By Redactor
Post date March 4, 2020
1 Comment on Engineering Government Limits

Lord Acton’s Law of Power states the chief problem of government: “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

It has broad application.

Take traffic lights. They are there to prevent accidents and make navigating roads a better experience for all. The basic idea is to establish and enforce a few basic rules and then let civilization proceed at the pace set by the people themselves. It won’t be perfect, but it won’t be tyranny, either.

But controlling traffic lights is a kind of power.

And thus open to corruption.

Just ask Mats Järlström. After his wife got a “running a red light ticket” in Beaverton, Oregon — a town characterized on the show Veronica Mars as completely wholesome and innocent of guile — Mr. Järlström researched the yellow light timing system.

Using a sophisticated “extended kinematic equation,” obtained from his work background in Sweden, he sought to right the wrong that led to his wife’s ticket and found himself mired in government overreach.

You see, the Oregon Board of Examiners for Engineering and Land Surveying objected to his practicing engineering without a license.

The board sought to bury his findings about how yellow lights have been calibrated in Oregon — which he had shown encouraged behavior that would allow governments to maximize revenue . . . not safety.

That’s corruption. The intersection lights’ setup turned a safety measure into a means to fleece motorists — and the engineering board corruptly twisted its mission to suppress the truth.

Thankfully, the Institute for Justice stepped in, and Järlström won in court.

Oregon now has new intersection lighting standards, and the power of the government professional board has been curbed.

A win for limited government!

And Common Sense, which This Is. I’m Paul Jacob.

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