I woke up at 6am Saturday morning to serve as a patient for a graduating dental school student as she tried to pass her board exams. As I was waiting, I noticed that the testers and graders were not affiliated with her dental school, and the exam was a state exam. It turns out that the agency which provides the exams, the Council of Interstate Testing Agencies, is a nonprofit corporation providing examination services to a number of states for their dental licensing.
I found this interesting in a few ways. Many people think that the only entity which should be authorized to license or test anyone is the government. This is simply not true. CITA is an independent, nonprofit agency with the sole purpose of serving as an objective third party with knowledgeable dentists on staff who can grade the students’ work and decide if it meets licensing requirements. This is the essence of privatization, as long as the government contracts hiring this company are sent out for bids and don’t overpay CITA. The group started with only Mississippi and North Carolina and has now expanded to a number of states, along with Puerto Rico.
Many people say, How can you trust a private corporation that is not the government to provide these important services? The answer is simple: free market capitalism. If the agency or company doesn’t provide good service and exactly what it is supposed to for the states, the state will turn to a different provider, which will have to in turn show that it is better than the preceding agency in order to keep the state’s business. If the nonprofit or corporation doesn’t provide good results, they won’t be able to continue because they won’t have clients.
Why not take it a step further and allow a nonprofit organization, made of dentists as CITA is, to decide what is necessary for someone to be a licensed dentist and get rid of state laws regarding occupational licensing altogether?
If the nonprofits start taking capitalism to heart and turning a profit at the same time, that’s all the better for everyone.
Tags: Occupational licensing, dental boards, state exams, state licensing laws, licensing laws libertarian
Leave a Reply