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Follow up on a point in the Apocalypse thread on regulation

Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

As usual, a thread has drifted, and instead of drifting it further I thought I'd side-step to a new thread. In the thread on Apocalypse - Civilization building they've gotten down to the point of current government regulations affecting how people will likely respond in a future disaster.

That got me to thinking on how over regulation is suppressing needed services and stopping people from working in various fields, and this leads on to how that affects the availability of needed services in a post apocalyptic world. If the skills degrade now, what will they be like later?

An example of what I mean in degrading services. In the past people would commence work in various fields, and their work would assist them in adding skills to prepare them for promotion. If not skill related certifications were needed the work organised them. Now the government regulations often require people to have the certifications before they can be employed. An example in my state is the paramedic qualifications for ambulance staff. Years ago you got the basic qualification and worked a couple of years, then you did part time studies with work support to get the next level up, and so on. Then the government legislated government control of all the private ambulance services, then set regulations for any work on an ambulance. So you have to have the qualifications before you apply, but the same now applies for the higher level qualified jobs and the government isn't helpful in doing the studies. So, if you want a promotion that requires a higher level certification you have to do all the studies on your own time and dime. The result, after a few years, is people are retiring from those positions and there aren't enough qualified people to fill all the roles because the lower level people can't manage to get the quals on their own due to family and full-time work commitments. Long term, in a major disaster the number of available trained personnel is going to be less per 1,000 people and at a lower level. Many of the government security clearances have to be held prior to applying for some jobs, too. Another thing to make it harder to work in the field and discourage people from the industry.

What other fields are so affected by over regulation, and how do you think it will affect the post apocalyptic scenario.

typo edit

Zom ๐Ÿšซ

@Ernest Bywater

What other fields are so affected by over regulation

I think you are correct, but I don't think you have understood, or at least articulated, the more insidious reasons for the "over regulation".

In the end, the qualifications requirements are a form of laziness and incompetence. It is rampant in ALL walks of business and services. It is the Peter Principle in full force.

Back in "the day" supervisors and managers, and those responsible for recruiting, actually knew the job, and could assess prospects directly and accurately for the most part. Once the Peter Principle starts to saturate supervisory and management levels (mostly for political reasons) a method has to be found to assess prospects without knowing how, and the nearly universal method used now is to abrogate the responsibility to the institutions doing the training/educating. The notion being that if a prospect has the qualifications he must know how, and if, after he has been chosen, he doesn't know how, the blame can be laid squarely on the institution that provided the qualification, thus covering the recruiter's behind.

In the worst case scenario, a civilisation shattering event would leave us with a dearth of capable people with actual experience, and very few with leadership or management qualities that are not entirely dependent on the institutional frameworks.

Hopefully the incapable ones would not last long, and not take too many with them/

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@Zom

I think you are correct, but I don't think you have understood, or at least articulated, the more insidious reasons for the "over regulation".

In the end, the qualifications requirements are a form of laziness and incompetence.

You too have missed the true reasons behind such regulations.

Professional licensing is most often lobbied for by incumbents in the field as a means of reducing competition.

Replies:   Ross at Play  REP  Not_a_ID  Zom  Grant
Ross at Play ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

Professional licensing is most often lobbied for by incumbents in the field as a means of reducing competition.

Your right about how the professions frequently seek to restrict new entrant. The same thing can happen in other fields where practitioners operate independently, for example plumbers and electricians.
In my view, the most powerful "union" in Australia is, by a long way, doctors!
But for services where the government is ultimately footing the bill, I think it is overwhelmingly budget restraints, not entrance qualifications, limiting numbers.

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@Ross at Play

In my view, the most powerful "union" in Australia is, by a long way, doctors!
But for services where the government is ultimately footing the bill, I think it is overwhelmingly budget restraints, not entrance qualifications, limiting numbers.

I'd modify that comment on the health service to say it's budget wastage on bureaucratic empire building in HQs, and restrictions on the issue of Medicare License Numbers by the bureaucrats. I know qualified doctors who don't work as doctors because they have family reasons to live in a particular area and Medicare won't issue them with a license because they limit the number of licenses in many areas. No Medicare License means no bulk billing or government refunds of any fees, few people can pay the full costs, so no point in setting up business. Yet they say they need doctors.

There's always enough money int he budget for new furniture for the Health Dept HQ office staff furniture, but not for medical equipment or services.

REP ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

Professional licensing is most often lobbied for by incumbents in the field as a means of reducing competition.

I don't know about 'most often', but my daughter in caught in a Professional Licensing movement here in California.

She is a board certified Behavioral Analyst. In order to be certified, she first had to get a Master's Degree, take another year of specialize training, and then pass a certification test. If I recall correctly, she said there are less than 150 board certified Behavioral Analysts here in California.

The medical insurance companies in California are pushing for licensing Behavioral Analysts. They want to require everyone providing "treatment" to people with behavioral problems to be licensed. They also want to pay Licensed Behavioral Analysts about $16/hour.

Sounds to us as a means of justifying not having to pay for the medical treatment their policy holders receive from the people and companies that provide the service. A Behavioral Analyst can typically handle a case load of around 20 people and the requirements for licensure means that initially there will be less than 200 people to treat over 100,000 patients. There is a transition period, but it will take a person starting from scratch around 4 years of schooling to qualify for the position.

Although I do have to admit that the insurance companies do have one valid point; namely, some of the companies fill their positions with anyone who applies and put them to work in the positions after providing only 2-3 weeks of training.

Replies:   Jim S
Jim S ๐Ÿšซ

@REP

They also want to pay Licensed Behavioral Analysts about $16/hour.

You can almost make that much flipping burgers. Who is going to go to school for 5(?) years for that?

I'll provide one other example of shortages. My son is Kalifornia got eased out of his job and decided to switch careers. So he started taking welding classes. If one believes the Commerce Dept. data, there is a shortage of roughly 600,000 right now (or so I've read). Once the shale oil find in the Permian Basin is opened by Trump, expect that number to go up. As well as the renewal of drilling in North Dakota with oil over $50/barrel again. For those that want the work, and are willing to work long hours, a 6 figure annual wage is within reach.

Shortages by guilds (in Middle Ages) or labor unions (today, but essentially the same thing) work to limit the market so prices (wages) are kept high. Someone mentioned doctors. Lawyers also. Accountants with the CPA exam. All of those professions are well compensated. And it stays that way until some way is found to remove the high cost labor. By either introducing competition or finding ways to get along without the labor (remember auto companies and automation?).

I see these things going through cycles. From plenty to shortage back to plenty. With wages offering the signal to draw people to or drive them away from a profession/career/skill/whatever. But it happens over long periods of times. Decades/centuries, not years.

Not_a_ID ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

Professional licensing is most often lobbied for by incumbents in the field as a means of reducing competition.

And a great big hug to our friends in the various unions out there. A lot of the stranger regulations that exist in several fields can be traced back to (trade) unions pushing for laws they thought would require employers to hire more workers... And grow their ranks as a result.

Zom ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

You too have missed the true reasons

Maybe, but I don't think so.

Certainly, professional associations/institutes/colleges will try to close ranks by limiting admissions when they feel the market is saturating, but that is at the tail end of any qualifications process. The groups without strong discipline/industry organisations are suffering from saturation everywhere.

I know where I live the "training" industry was seen as a panacea for the economy, and vast numbers of ridiculous qualification requirements were created and recreated in order to ensure vast sums of money were spent on "training", without the necessary oversight.

We are just now starting to suffer the inevitable consequences of that political convenience. People who are certified to do work they have little or no idea about making disasters wherever they go. Educational institutions taking the money and running, and not just a few. etc. etc.

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@Zom

I know where I live the "training" industry was seen as a panacea for the economy,

Yeah we had that here in Australia with the National Reform of Training organised under Bob Hawke as PM back in the late 1980s. The end result was requirements for people working in an industry to be:

a. Certified by an approved training institution to do the work,

b. Have a current certification that was either:

1. issued within the lat 5 years, or

2. re-certified with a currency course certificate issued within the last 5 years, or

3. being actively using that skill for more than 50% of their work in the industry for 5 of the last 8 years.

If your certification wasn't current as per the above, you had to do the training all over again and not able to work in the industry until you got the new certification. All sounds good, right - yet bookkeeping and accounting skills and practices haven't changed more decades, but take a 5 year break and you've no longer got a valid skill. The same is true of most teaching positions. Yet, mind you, they don't apply to top management positions. Although lower and middle management positions need to re-certify their skills top management doesn't.

Grant ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

Professional licensing is most often lobbied for by incumbents in the field as a means of reducing competition.

Or for maintaining minimum levels of competence.

Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@Grant

Or for maintaining minimum levels of competence.

So those lobbying for them claim, but , with few exceptions, in the long run such occupational licensing laws tend to produce a greater reduction in competition than they do an increase in competence.

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/2015/12/30/occupational-licenses-rollback/78105372/

Replies:   Grant
Grant ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

So those lobbying for them claim, but , with few exceptions, in the long run such occupational licensing laws tend to produce a greater reduction in competition than they do an increase in competence.

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/2015/12/30/occupational-licenses-rollback/78105372/

And there are those industries where standards & requirements were relaxed, and every one has suffered as a result.

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@Grant

And there are those industries where standards & requirements were relaxed, and every one has suffered as a result.

For every one of those, there are ten where the standards & requirements are absurd and unnecessary.

Replies:   Wheezer
Wheezer ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

For every one of those, there are ten where the standards & requirements are absurd and unnecessary.

Interesting claim. Can you back it up?

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@Wheezer

Interesting claim. Can you back it up?

From the link I posted above from the Detroit News:

In July, the White House released a report detailing how occupational licensing laws have proliferated: "(M)ore than one-quarter of U.S. workers now require a license to do their jobs." At the state level, "the share of workers licensed ... has risen five-fold since the 1950s."

And

According to the Institute for Justice, no fewer than 42 of the 100-most common low- and moderate-income jobs in the state require licenses. Barber. Fisher. Makeup artist. On the whole, the average Michigan license costs $198 and requires 256 days in education or training.

Is this really necessary?

Not to mention:

And those are just some of the state occupational licenses. There are even more passed by cities like Detroit, which only restrict further an individual's attempt to earn a living. These laws vary โ€” and conflict โ€” from city to city and state to state, making it that much harder for Michiganians to find work and make a living.

Licensing hurts the poor.

We're starting to learn how much harm occupational licenses have caused. The White House put it best, saying licensing can "raise the price of goods and services" and "restrict employment opportunities" for those who need them most.

And with so many occupations requiring licensing, if you have ever been convicted of a crime but are trying to become a productive member of society You are screwed.

These licenses also harm those who have run afoul of the justice system. Once nonviolent ex-offenders pay their debt to society, they should be encouraged to rejoin it by finding a job or starting a business. Sadly, their government bars them from pursuing a career that requires a license.

Replies:   REP  sejintenej
REP ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

While I tend to agree with what you are saying, your response did not address why the standard and requirements are absurd and unnecessary.

I recall several times when I thought something was stupid until the reason for it was explained to me.

For example, it seemed stupid to me that a barber needed X hours of training to get a license so they can cut hair? When I asked, I was told the training includes information on hair car products, equipment, etc., that if improperly used could injure a client.

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@REP

When I asked, I was told the training includes information on hair car products, equipment, etc., that if improperly used could injure a client.

Yes, but with out knowing how much of the total required training is that kind of safety information it doesn't really mean a damn thing.

It makes a big difference if that is half the required training or only one tenth of the required training.

They never give that information to the general public when they use such thing to justify occupational licensing?

I wonder why? In my opinion the most likely answer is because such safety related information is such a small part of the training that the general public would be up in arms if they knew.

Replies:   REP
REP ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

I wonder why?

For the most part, I suspect it is an excuse that allows them to inflict another tax of the working public. In a few instances, it's justified.

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@REP

In a few instances, it's justified.

In very few instances.

sejintenej ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

@Dominions Son

In July, the White House released a report detailing how occupational licensing laws have proliferated: "(M)ore than one-quarter of U.S. workers now require a license to do their jobs." At the state level, "the share of workers licensed ... has risen five-fold since the 1950s."

In the fifties it was a term of my contract that I become Associate of the Institute of Bankers - a qualification which is officially rated as a university degree just to be a teller in a bank.

Our CPAs reckon that the accountancy part is harder than their exams and the law side is very definitely more detailed than a lawyer must pass. (That said we didn't do as much tax work or family law).

edit: I have translated UK terms into their approximate US equivalents

Replies:   Dominions Son
Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@sejintenej

In the fifties it was a term of my contract that I become Associate of the Institute of Bankers - a qualification which is officially rated as a university degree just to be a teller in a bank.

Certifications required by employers by their own choice are not in any way equivalent to occupational licenses required by law.

Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@Grant

Or for maintaining minimum levels of competence.

In a way, that's sort of what happened with some of the training and educations made here in the late 1980s. The accounting professionals set a standard they wanted as a minimum uniform level. That's all well and good, but then the academics stuck their oar in and stirred it up by convincing the government they needed to have their institutions re-certify everyone every five years, despite the skills used not changing for many decades, so the government then embeds that in regulations. result, all the people (mostly women) who took 5 or 6 years off to get families up to going to school age, are no longer qualified to do the work they were doing before (despite absolutely no changes in it) and they don't have the time or money to do the all the training again. Thus people keep leaving and never coming back because it's now too hard to do so - then the professionals wonder why they have skills shortages in their field. This issue isn't limited to the accounting field, but it's more blatant there.

Ross at Play ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

@Ernest Bywater

What other fields are so affected by over regulation

I do not see over regulation as a major driving force of the overall trend you see (although there are surely some examples of that).

The major driving force I see is the substantial increase over recent decades in the average number of years of education young people have before entering the workforce proper.

The total number of workers in various job classifications changes very slowly (albeit with underlying long-term trends such as away from manufacturing and towards services and technology).

If the number of jobs in various classifications is relatively stable, and the average years of education in the population is rising more quick;y, the entrance requirements for all base-grade positions will tend to rise.

The salaries and other benefits various positions offer is over the long term balancing out the educational choices of young people to the availability of positions.

That's good ole capitalism at work!

I see government decisions on allocations of resources as the primarily driving force causing the trend you see for inadequacies in services like paramedics.

People do tend to base voting decisions on who might keep their taxes lower, rather than how it will take for an ambulance to arrive when they really need one.

That's good ole democracy at work!

Replies:   Not_a_ID
Not_a_ID ๐Ÿšซ

@Ross at Play

If the number of jobs in various classifications is relatively stable, and the average years of education in the population is rising more quickly, the entrance requirements for all base-grade positions will tend to rise.

However, we have a converse thing going on, which is also causing the requirements to rise. As more people spend more time pursuing education, the "typical" quality of said education is also declining(or at least the quality of the person being educated is, maybe both).

There are high school students graduating today who know less about many things than an 8th grader probably knew 50 years ago. Likewise, there are Associate's Degree holders who likely know less about wide range of things compared to a High School Degree holder from 50 years ago.

There are multiple factors in play in that phenomena but it's out there. (A big one being that 50 years ago, many people who weren't motivated to pursue "further education" (which often included a High School Degree) didn't. They'd drop out and never get a High School Degree. So just getting that degree meant something(as it was largely optional for many jobs).

Move forward a couple decades, High School Diplomas become profligate, and the "quality of the graduates" declines, because now nearly everybody graduates, which now includes the unmotivated. Which means things move up to "the next level of motivation" which would be a certificate of some kind, or an Associate's Degree(2 yr). Which then held out until the 90's, when 2 yr colleges started to become a dime a dozen, and "paper mill" schools started to crop up(further degrading the quality of the "typical degree holder"). Which in turn moved the bar up to 4 year degrees, and everyone started getting those as well, which is where employers then started offering "starting" job positions in their company--with a 1 to 3 year work experience requirement.

Things have continued on that path since.

But it also comes back on the MBA's and this from Zom:

Back in "the day" supervisors and managers, and those responsible for recruiting, actually knew the job, and could assess prospects directly and accurately for the most part. Once the Peter Principle starts to saturate supervisory and management levels (mostly for political reasons) a method has to be found to assess prospects without knowing how, and the nearly universal method used now is to abrogate the responsibility to the institutions doing the training/educating. The notion being that if a prospect has the qualifications he must know how, and if, after he has been chosen, he doesn't know how, the blame can be laid squarely on the institution that provided the qualification, thus covering the recruiter's behind.

The popular MBA school of thought is that management is management. So you should be able to take a line manager at a shoe factory, and plop him down at a tire factory and he should be able to "manage" it just as well as he could the show factory line. Hell, you should be able to plop him down as management at a line working for Intel, Dell, or any of a long list of other high-tech employers as well.

Which gets us into the Management that now makes hiring decisions in many situations has no idea what they're actually hiring for. So they're checking for "qualifying skills/certifications" rather than actual knowledge or demonstrable skills.

Of course, further muddying the waters is things like Civil rights legislation from the 1960's and later, where having a hard set, in writing, listing of "required qualifications" for employment also helps shield them from claims of "discriminatory hiring practices" if push comes to shove.

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@Not_a_ID

because now nearly everybody graduates, which now includes the unmotivated.

In some cases the local laws are they have to stay in school until they turn 17 or 18 years of age - those who don't want to be there, and a re forced to be there, are a disruptive influence and thus make it harder for others to learn as well.

As to what you say about management, they also teach (in management classes) the only aim is to make money, never such things as a quality product, keeping people employed, or keeping the business long term viable.

ustourist ๐Ÿšซ

@Ernest Bywater

It is a lot more pervasive than that, as it extends into areas where lack of qualification and competence are also an entry into 'professional' careers.
In accountancy, trainees are expected to be able to do basic checks on computerized systems, but there is (unless it has recently changed) no requirement to even be able to do basic manual bookkeeping or create books from incomplete records, let alone ability to check for transposition of numbers.
Likewise in engineering, basic mathematical knowledge like multiplication and division accepts the use of computers and calculators, not the ability to use handwritten calculations or slide rules.
Whilst language barriers can often be broken down by grunts and drawings, even basic engineering calculations need some knowledge of maths and I believe - though am not certain - that even the times tables are no longer taught beyond 10 in the UK or US.
Motor mechanics now use plug in systems to notify them of errors and replace a gearbox or head rather than strip down a motor and repair it. Many car mechanics couldn't actually build an engine even if they had all the parts and a manual.
It does seem the dumbing down has occurred since administrators were used to run professions rather than experienced and qualified individuals, but fortunately there are still a lot of people interested in learning because they want to know, not because it is their career, so there is a hidden and unknown resource, albeit often self taught with a belief that what they read on the internet is true.

Replies:   Ross at Play
Ross at Play ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

@ustourist

I don't see the changing nature of skill sets needed for jobs because of new technology asa major problem - UNLESS there is an apocalypse.

I suggest for EB, there may be something much more relevant to a post-apocalyptic scenario that professions being eroded by over regulation.

That might be which professions would be incapable of functioning anymore without the technology they have come to rely on.

The comments by @ustourist suggest all accountants, engineers, and car mechanics could not function after an apocalypse, for starters!

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@Ross at Play

I suggest for EB, there may be something much more relevant to a post-apocalyptic scenario that professions being eroded by over regulation.

That can apply too, so can the loss of skills due to not learning the older methods. But I was looking more at things like the higher skill levels of ambulance workers and the like. The regulations put in last in the last few decades has made it harder for people to enter the field, or to obtain higher level qualifications. 30 years ago it was common to see ambulances crewed with all the staff at the highest level of qualification for the work, instead of the one high level and one base or intermediate level. Today, you're lucky if an ambulance has one at the intermediate level instead of both at the base level qualification. - Yes, I know it varies a lot, but the overall average qualification level has dropped due to the regulations making it harder to get upgraded, mostly due to the reduced number of entry level people meaning those in the system can't get approved time off on pay to do extra quals. This means the overall level of medical services within the community are lower, and that can affect a post apocalyptic situation due to missing or lost skills.

Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

Regarding the regulations themselves, the concern I have is where certain types of jobs were such that you could start employment in the job, then get employment assisted education to get better qualified to move up the line while doing the scut work a qualification wasn't needed for. However, changes in the government regulations put a stop to that by setting in place rules no one could work in the industry until AFTER they received a set qualification. Thus the entry bar is higher, and means a lot of people couldn't enter the industry because they couldn't afford to get the certification without working, and working at another job reduced the time available for the training. This reduces the number of new people entering the field. It also reduces the people involved in certification upgrades due to reduced time to do the training.

In some cases it's worse. You can't do any sort of security guard work in my state unless you have a certification that costs a couple of thousand dollars to do for two weeks of training. You need the same cert to sit in a locked warehouse to see no one breaks in while having no interaction with anyone, as a guard who works as a bouncer at a major entertainment venue, or driving around in a car checking gates and doors on buildings, on the door of a bank etc. The only extra cert you need is for an armed guard, which is more big bucks. The regulations require you to be certified before you can be employed, so the companies only employ certified people now, thus everyone has to pay for the training themselves. The companies aren't allowed to tie you in with multi-year work contracts, so they don't pay for the training. The result is every security company that used to have employment waiting lists can't get enough staff now. Even retired military personnel need to get the civilian certificates before they can work in the industry. Mind you, they aren't certifications you can get on the government dollar, either.

Replies:   StarFleet Carl
StarFleet Carl ๐Ÿšซ

@Ernest Bywater

Even retired military personnel need to get the civilian certificates before they can work in the industry.

Tell me about it. I did at one point work for a security company, unarmed. But that was years ago. Now to get any certification, you have to go through CLEET training on your own dime, pass their security guard training, and if you want to be armed, you need additional training and certification.

To sit in a guard shack and watch the front gate. Which anyone who's been through military training already knows how to do.

richardshagrin ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

Once upon a time schools did a better job of educating their students. Most kids went to work when they reached their teens, having passed grade school or gotten sufficient basic education. In some cases that would be 8th grade, or in others having learned the 3 R's. (Of course that spells mathematics as Rithmatic.)

High School was definitely not automatic and more of a luxury, for families that could afford for their children to be non-productive. Very few jobs required a high school education. Even fewer people went on to University/College. You wanted to be in a profession that required the additional knowledge, something like a medical doctor, religious professional (priest, minister, or preacher in an organized religion), or some other recognized profession. Lawyers mostly studied law like Lincoln did, by apprenticeship. Some medical professionals also studied by apprenticeship. Again you had to be wealthy to go to college. Not just to pay the costs, but to forgo the wages or salary you could earn during the 8 years or so that you were attending high school and college.

One reason we send so many children to so much school is to keep them out of the labor pool so older workers have higher earnings. And they moved the marriage age to somewhere in the 20s from the fairly early teens. What would the true unemployment numbers be if they measured all the individuals who are old enough to work for pay including all the people forced into retirement by corporate policies. As people get older their salaries tend to rise. By cutting off their employment at their mid to late sixties they can replace their mature salaries with fresh, new, underpaid faces.

Replies:   StarFleetCarl
StarFleetCarl ๐Ÿšซ

@richardshagrin

Once upon a time schools did a better job of educating their students. Most kids went to work when they reached their teens, having passed grade school or gotten sufficient basic education.

We also used to take shop classes in high school, where you learned wood working skills, welding skills, and assorted other real world job skills. But that's what participation trophies give you.

sejintenej ๐Ÿšซ

@Ernest Bywater

That got me to thinking on how over regulation is suppressing needed services and stopping people from working in varies fields, and this leads on to how that affects the availability of needed services in a post apocalyptic world.

A stupid requirement here; if you are going to be anywhere near children you need the prospective employer to get a certificate that you don't have a record etc. To prove who you are employers need a birth certificate and proof of address.

If you were adopted then you are not allowed to have a birth certificate (you get an Adoption Certificate instead) so you are banned from getting the certificate which would enable to work where there are children.

Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@sejintenej

A stupid requirement here; if you are going to be anywhere near children you need the prospective employer to get a certificate that you don't have a record etc. To prove who you are employers need a birth certificate and proof of address.

We have a similar regulation, but they do allow you to prove your identity by successive documents. However, the individual must get the certification from the gov't authority and provide it to the employer who then confirms it with the government, even applies to church groups. If a person is giving a Sunday School lesson to children (anyone under 16 or 18 - varies with state) they have to get the certification. If no certificate they can't even supervise the kids playing on the grass.

Dominions Son ๐Ÿšซ

@sejintenej

If you were adopted then you are not allowed to have a birth certificate

This is the truly stupid requirement. Just because you were adopted, doesn't mean you weren't born.

Replies:   sejintenej
sejintenej ๐Ÿšซ

@Dominions Son

sejintenej

If you were adopted then you are not allowed to have a birth certificate

This is the truly stupid requirement. Just because you were adopted, doesn't mean you weren't born.

Yes and no!
An adoption Certificate looks like a birth certificate except for the title and changing "parents" to "adopters" etc.. For any normal purpose (like getting a passport)it is accepted in place of a birth certificate. It is just the education authorities who are uneducated.

An adoptee generally cannot know who his/her birth parents are/were. It is supposed to protect both birth parents and the adoptee. In my lifetime the rules have been relaxed a bit - after satisfying a psycho that he / she will not be mentally affected the names of the birth parents can be released.

I got my original birth certificate without the testing or producing ID, simply by saying that I wanted a copy of my own birth certificate (From the age of 16 I knew the full history through two adoptions and even remember being in court for the second one). That should not have been allowed.

Wheezer ๐Ÿšซ

@sejintenej

If you were adopted then you are not allowed to have a birth certificate (you get an Adoption Certificate instead) so you are banned from getting the certificate which would enable to work where there are children.

I was adopted at birth. I have the "birth certificate" issued to my parents by the State of Kansas in 1952. It shows them as my parents and does not mention adoption anywhere on the document. I have a copy of my original birth certificate from the State of Missouri showing my birth mother, father unknown, and my birth name of Hughey.

REP ๐Ÿšซ
Updated:

There is one aspect of training and certification that is not being addressed, namely the instructors and curriculum associated with training and certifying people as competent to function in a position of employment. Consider this from the POV that the skills and knowledge to do a specific job evolves and failure to remain current job experience results in loss of certification.

The Training Institution's curriculum supposedly addresses the knowledge and skills necessary to perform a job. But does it? Who determines if a curriculum is adequate? What experience and knowledge must the person making that determination need?

Then there are the instructors. What are their qualifications to teach the subject? Teaching job tasks is not the same as doing the tasks in a work environment. Many skills require constant usage in order to maintain a high degree of proficiency. An instructor does not constantly use the skill, so they lose proficiency. So what certification do the instructors require, if any, and how do they become certified?

whodoo ๐Ÿšซ

Ernest Bywater
12/5/2016, 8:20:11 AM

@Ross at Play

I suggest for EB, there may be something much more relevant to a post-apocalyptic scenario that professions being eroded by over regulation.

That can apply too, so can the loss of skills due to not learning the older methods. But I was looking more at things like the higher skill levels of ambulance workers and the like. The regulations put in last in the last few decades has made it harder for people to enter the field, or to obtain higher level qualifications. 30 years ago it was common to see ambulances crewed with all the staff at the highest level of qualification for the work, instead of the one high level and one base or intermediate level. Today, you're lucky if an ambulance has one at the intermediate level instead of both at the base level qualification. - Yes, I know it varies a lot, but the overall average qualification level has dropped due to the regulations making it harder to get upgraded, mostly due to the reduced number of entry level people meaning those in the system can't get approved time off on pay to do extra quals. This means the overall level of medical services within the community are lower, and that can affect a post apocalyptic situation due to missing or lost skills.

Ernest I finally found where you mentioned you were in Australia. I spent my career in EMS (Emergency medical services) in the US but had some exposure to Australian EMS providers. A couple things to point out. EMS is controlled by the the MD who covers that area. He can be a progressive thinker and have up to date/advanced people or he can be regressive and hold them back to older minimalist standards. The old system of advancing in place worked fine when you had relatively small steps from basic to advanced skills. When the idea of Paramedics came along that was a huge jump up in skills and knowledge and not something that was quick and easy to learn on a few evenings a week. It definitely needed an honest actual course to learn. If you didn't do it that way you would produce what we refer to as "cookbook" medics. I.E. they could read a recipe of what to do but they didn't have the knowledge base to truly understand it and if the situation was even slightly out of normal they didn't have the depth to figure it out and provide proper care. Your last point of that overall level of medical services is dropping widely is at least in the US not true. The training is higher now and advancing yearly. Continuing education is required to keep them up to date also.

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@whodoo

EMS is controlled by the the MD who covers that area.

That may be the case in the USA. However, I've a retired friend who was on the ambulances for most of his life. Here in Australia the bulk of the ambulance services weren't government owned, most were organised by a private charitable organisation called St John's Ambulance Service. They also provided accredited training for first aid and up to advanced paramedic services. In the 1980s the government socialised the entire health care system, as a result of that the various state governments stole billions of dollars of assets by taking control of community based hospitals (in short if it was a owned by a company they took it) and the ambulance services, with the requirements set, and management, by bureaucrats in the Sydney Head Office.

With the SJA services you USED to be able to get a job with them, and they'd train you, counting the course time as work time, because they believed in having everyone as highly qualified as they could get them. However, when the state governments took over the ambulance service they stopped doing that and said it was up to the individuals to get higher qualifications on their own time. No easy to do while working the shifts they did, especially if they had a family. Thus the rate of increasing skills of staff on ambulances slowed down and has been all but still for many years. As the staff who had higher qualifications at the time of take over have retired the average level of qualification for the staff have gone down due to lower rates of staff upgrading qualifications.

The SJA still run courses, but not as many or as often as they used to run, not sure if they still do the higher level ones. Most of the higher levels ones are now done by a few accredited universities and the like.

Replies:   sejintenej
sejintenej ๐Ÿšซ

@Ernest Bywater

The SJA still run courses, but not as many or as often as they used to run, not sure if they still do the higher level ones. Most of the higher levels ones are now done by a few accredited universities and the like.

In the UK any workplace with more than a small number of employees must have a qualified first aider on site. Various organisations including St Johns Ambulance do the courses but the required standard is pretty low.
They also do many more advanced courses - I started at school when I was 16 and went through most of them (because of the Cold War) though at that time we didn't use drugs as modern paramedics can.

SJA is linked with the Order of St John of Jerusalem which goes back to the crusades to Jerusalem.

Replies:   Ernest Bywater
Ernest Bywater ๐Ÿšซ

@sejintenej

Various organisations including St Johns Ambulance do the courses but the required standard is pretty low.

Yeah, we have similar laws on First Aid people, however, the SJA here used to also run the Ambulance service with highly trained paramedics, much higher than First Aid certificates. But not for a few decades thanks to the government stealing their services and equipment for a fraction of what they're worth.

richardshagrin ๐Ÿšซ

I thought a para-medic was one who jumped out of airplanes, using a parachute. Like para-transit involves getting to your job by plane and parachute.

Not_a_ID ๐Ÿšซ

Ambulance service in the U.S. is widely variable. Largely depending on what state, county, or city you're in.

In my hometown, Ambulance service is an auxiliary provided by the local Fire Department in town. Generally speaking, in the rural areas of my state, the respective counties in turn manage their own Ambulance service. Of course we also still have a number of (majority) county-owned (not state) hospitals kicking around that have been around for decades, or longer. But as you get into the highly urbanized areas, you see private hospitals, and private ambulance service contractors, be they specialized in medical transport between facilities, or first responders. Sometimes the hospital itself maintains some of its own ambulances. (Not counting the "Air Ambulances" be they plane or helicopter, as those are either owned by the hospital, or under contract by them)

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