In Washington, prior to being licensed, here's a list of the number of hours required to obtain certain professional licenses:
...to become a Real Estate appraiser? About 3,000.Were these generated by in-house best business practices, or bureaucratic / legislative studies? They certainly don't seem to be generated by common sense. Posted by Brian Crouch at April 29, 2005 12:38 PM | Email This
...to become a Hair stylist? About 1,500.
...to become a Real Estate agent? About 60.
...to become a Home inspector? None, trick question, they don't have licensing requirement.
No, you don't need a license. But if you are a Democrat, you will need crack cocaine.
Now before the trolls chime in accusing me of an unfounded allegation, pleae go this site and read about it:
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041019/NEWS09/410190343
"Voter fraud case traced to Defiance County registrations volunteer
124 registrations falsified, allegedly for crack cocaine
Defiance County Sheriff David Westrick said that Mr. Staton was working on behalf of a Toledo woman, Georgianne Pitts, to register new voters. She, in turn, was working on behalf of the NAACP National Voter Fund, which was formed by the NAACP in 2000 to register new voters.
Sheriff Westrick said that Pitts, 41, of Toledo, admitted she gave Mr. Staton crack cocaine in lieu of cash for supplying her with completed voter registration forms. "
Posted by: VCRW on April 29, 2005 01:17 PM"ONE SUSAN LINDAUER was arrested today on charges that she acted as a spy for the Iraqi Intelligence service, and accepted $10,000 for the information she gathered. See the full story here.
Lindauer is identified as a "Takoma Park, MD woman" in news accounts, which allege that she made multiple visits from October 1999 through March 2002 to the Iraqi Mission to the United Nations in New York. She also traveled to Baghdad in February and March of 2002.
As of April 2002, a Susan Lindauer was in the employ of Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Lindauer previously worked in the press offices of Democrats Rep. Peter DeFazio of Oregon (from approximately May 1993 to January 1994), Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon (starting in January 1994), and Former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois (from January 1996 to September 1996)."
Source:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/842odgdw.asp
Posted by: VCRW on April 29, 2005 01:21 PMLindauer is a former journalist for U.S. News & World Report, as well as for Fortune magazine and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. She also worked as a spokeswoman for then-Representative (and now Senator) Ron Wyden of Oregon, as well as former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun.
Posted by: VCRW on April 29, 2005 01:26 PMAnd your little rant has what to do with this topic?
And the point of this whole thread is what? You want tougher licensing or lesser licensing requirements. It should be noted that while technically home inspectors have no licensing requirements, per se, to do home inspection today, you probably have to be a pest inspector also, which do have licesning requirements.
Posted by: JDB on April 29, 2005 01:39 PMThat Democrats pay for fraudulent voter registrations with crack cocaine is quite germaine to the topic. How much crack is the DNC paying YOU to troll this board?
Posted by: VCRW on April 29, 2005 01:42 PMOccupational licensing always exists to protect the members of an occupation against competition.
Posted by: Carol on April 29, 2005 01:55 PMWhat one peripherial Democrat buying one person crack has to do with licensing requirements I just can't fathom. Forgive me if my mind is not as great as yours.
lksimstrailgrammy:
Assuming you are talking about the Lake Sammamish Trail, it is not being built on private property, but on a public right of way, own by the railroad, which got the land originally from the government to begin with. Anyone who bought land along the trail knew when they bought it that it was subject to the right of way. Would you rather have bicylists or a train there? Second, rails to trails have been shown to only increase property values. So, if you are paying for that, you are getting more back than you are paying in. Lucky you. (By the way, the Lake Sammamish trail was started long before Sims, you can't really blame him for it.)
Posted by: JDB on April 29, 2005 01:57 PMIf you can't handle the most elemental consepts, how are you supposed to keep up on the harder stuff?
Perhaps you should try the Pokemon thread down the way....
Posted by: Alphabet soup on April 29, 2005 02:00 PMHere is the list of gas bag government authorities I have to deal with to be in business. Even if I don't make a penny I have to pay off and/or file with the following:
-federal (corp biz tax)
-state (annual llc)
-state (quarterly b&o and usary tax)
-Thurston county (annual permit fee)
-Pierce county (annual permit fee)
Tacoma requirements
Annaul biz license
Permit fee
b & o tax (on ALL of my revenue, not just Tacoma revenue- what a freaking mafia that city is)
If I do biz in King County I expect that list to double again.
10% of my start up costs were usary taxes on capital equipment.
Yeah this state is really friendly to small biz entrepra-manure.
IN SPITE of this- I sank enough money and hard work into the venture that I could hire an employee at this point and create a NEW job- but not with the way the wind blows from Olympia now.
Instead I'm looking for other ways to invest my cash so the state can't get their hands on it.
Posted by: Andy on April 29, 2005 02:25 PMNice try at deflection. I know you are slow but try to keep up.
First, it wasn't one peripheral Democrat. It was a Democrat who was part of the NAACP was working on behalf of the NAACP National Voter Fund to falsely register people.
The topic was "Is a license required for falsely registering voters". Since the Democrat party seems to entice their "volunteers" with crack cocaine payments, it is in fact quite relevant.
Posted by: VCRW on April 29, 2005 02:27 PM"which got the land originally from the government to begin with". All things belong to the government unless big brother kindly allows us to have something.
That a "right-of-way" is a transfer of property, as opposed to allowing access to private property.
Posted by: Fred on April 29, 2005 02:27 PMAs for me, I am just a working class dog. But I'd like to see the state lighten up on the likes of you so I could see a little more in my check. But I guess I am a rare breed. An employee that understands that sticking it to the job makers in the state would be cutting my nose to spite my face.
As for the thread on the Lake Sammamish trail... Ah yes, I remember the days of the train. I used to see it go to the Darigold plant from time to time to pick up the load of "gub'ment cheese" for the dependent class.
That right-of-way was never originally "from the government". That is false propaganda as part of yet another King Ron attempt to seize private property. It was to revert to homeowners after the withdrawal of the railroad. Read the land titles.
Posted by: Mr. Grabbit on April 29, 2005 02:42 PMNot true regarding appraisal licenses. The licensed appraisal profession was set up in the wake of the savings and loan scandals in the 1980s because banks and their loan officers, with the assistance of an unregulated appraisal profession, were writing so many dubious loans with bogus numbers and overoptimistic return forecasts. Given that the government had to give a multi-billion dollar bailout to the S&Ls, don't you think the government has an interest in accountability and a system to prevent the abuses which already occurred?
Realtors and brokers are licensed because they are allegedly your agents and advocates when making what is likely the largest purchase of your life. Generally people want to know that these people have gone through at least some training. Realtors, if anything, ought to be forced to do even more training.
Both of these professions have legal culpability in their transactions and, as such, probably ought to be regulated to some degree, especially in light of the amount of money they attend and the associated potential for malfeasance.
Posted by: Rex on April 29, 2005 02:45 PMI'm not arguing against professional credentials, but the state shouldn't be the one looking after them. State standards are minimums which then tend to become default maximums. The state can't set the minimums too high because they will alienate voters.
If occupational licensing was really truly meant to save the consumers from themselves, then the institution of the licensing requirement would be different. When a licensing scheme is created, the existing practitioners tend to be automatically grandfathered into it. If protecting us poor mutton-headed consumers was really the purpose, every last stinking one of them would have to pass the test to get the license.
There are much better ways to provide high-quality practitioners of any occupation for consumers, and it doesn't require the government to do it.
Posted by: Carol on April 29, 2005 03:12 PMEven if joe (or jill)-lunch box foregos starting a family and drives a pile of junk car for an extra 5 years to scrape together enough money to buy a bowling alley or a car wash, forget about it- the state, county, and city are going to nickel and dime you to death on every nik nak permit and fee requirement along the way.
In the end you'll get sued on a frivolous lawsuit anyway...those GREEDY business owners of corporate America!!! Why the nerve of them trying to get ahead of the rest of us and pass something on to their children.
Posted by: Andy on April 29, 2005 03:54 PMI paid 150 bucks for my home business license. Why?
So the county could deny my other licenses and permits until they could do a drive by hello a month and a half later?
BIG GOVERNMENT.
Posted by: Andy on April 29, 2005 03:57 PMIMHO the sub-suburbs are still a good investment.
Inspections, assessment, state/county/city fees, permits, codes and regulations are still fresh in my mind (shake n shudder). Gov employees seemed to know they are just tax collectors. Sometimes the apathy was palpable.
I submitted a plot plan which took me several days to design. The county clerk took my money, handed me the permits then commented that "most people don't have such detailed plans". I got the impression that I could have drawn plans on a cocktail napkin (not really). It's really all about the taxes.. Oh, sorry, fees and permits.
Some of the process is a necessary evil but 75% of the process is an excuse for revenue.
When I was looking at places to move, I avoided one community in particular because they had a instituted a new "city inspection process" in addition to the county. That city lost a taxpayer because they want to strap on the old fee bag.
How many Gov employees does it take to screw in a light bulb?
None! That is not in their job description. They only screw tax payers.
Posted by: Splatter on April 29, 2005 04:50 PMNo one has to employ a realtor in order to buy and sell their house. Anyone who wants to have a realtor represent them needs to have a licensed realtor in order to pay them a commission. I tend to agree that the realtor association is a cartel but there do need to be educational requirements in order to be considered qualified. As it is, 60 hours of training does not seem adequate to allow someone to represent you on a leveraged purchase of a $400k+ investment.
Appraiser certification is altogether different. It is established at the federal level via a thing called FIRREA which is short for Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989. It is disseminated via the AQB, the Appraiser's Qualification Board which is then implemented by the states via licensing provisions. Again, appraising wouldn't be a licensed profession if it had not already been proven that lending in the real estate industry needs oversight and market stabilizers otherwise rampant fraud results.
Posted by: Rex on April 29, 2005 05:07 PMBeing in the real estate profession, I am aware of the requirements or lack thereof for home inspectors. I often work with home inspectors and just like every other profession, there are those who are comptetent and those who are not.
Just my two cents.
PS. The legislature is always looking to impose more costs to buyer's and sellers re: real estate transactions. This is why most of us belong to the Realtor Associations (which helps to lobby against more fees/taxes, etc.)
Posted by: Robyn on April 29, 2005 09:52 PMOn the other side of it, if you ask your brother to look over some new home you're looking at buying, should he need a license before doing so? But if I want a quality inspection, I'll want to look at the inspector's credentials.
A quick google of "home inspection association" turns up the likes of these:
http://www.nachi.org/
http://www.nahi.org/
http://www.nibi.com/
as well as prominent links to regional associations in Kentucky, Georgia, California, Canada (Ontario), and more.