Free the Dental Hygienists
One of the craziest policy practices common in the United States of America is widespread rules against self-employed dental hygienists…. The results, report Morris M. Kleiner and Kyoung Won Park, are bad for consumers and bad for economic equality:
We find that states that allow hygienists to be self-employed have about 10 percent higher earnings, and that dentists in those states have lower earnings and slower employment growth. Several sensitivity and falsification tests using other regulated and partially regulated occupations show that our licensing measures are generally robust to alternative specifications. Our estimates are consistent with the view that winning the policy and legal battle in the legislature and courts on the independence of work rules matters in the labor market for these occupations.
This is from a Matt Yglesias post.
And yet, self-employment is not inconsistent with supervision by a dentist, if the teeth cleaning, etc., takes place in the dentist’s office.
Employing a hygenist, on the other hand, means having to balance the load of other procedures with those the hygenist can perform, so that he or she produces enough revenue to cover the cost.
Medical licensure is generally more about protecting a profession from competition than about protecting the public from harm. Dental hygienists working independently would likely affiliate with dentists; but more money would accrue to the hygienist rather than to the sponsoring dentist. Many more people would probably go in for periodic teeth cleaning if they had access to a hygienist.
Colorado is one of the states where dental hygienists can set up stand-alone practices.
This has been going on for more than a decade, and as far as anyone can tell, no disasters have occurred and the earth has continued to spin on its axis.
Any pervert or liar can work in Congress, but heaven forbid if a dental hygienist wants to be self-employed.