On 5/31/2010 8:28 PM, HeyBub wrote:


I was answering a question ("How does that change the basic fact that anyone
in the U.S. can take
any job they can get hired for?").

My point was that, due to government interference, there are restrictions on
hiring, both on the putative employer and the prospective employee. These
restrictions can prevent a willing employer and a willing employee from
negotiating a mutually beneficial arrangement.



How can you assume that such a negotiation would always be mutually beneficial?
For example, let's say that you are an employer, owning lots of assets,
offering 20 jobs with 100s of workers already on your payroll, and I am an
unemployed, hungry, person about to be evicted for non-payment of rent. I am
desperate for money and you are not desperate to hire, just looking to ramp up
your production. You are in an excellent position to take advantage of me and
pay me less than I deserve, enabling me to pay my rent but only afford unhealthy
high fat junk food unless there are "government restrictions" on you that get us
closer to parity in our negotiations. On the other hand, I might be a totally
dishonest jerk who sees an opportunity to get a good paying professional job by
falsifying my credentials, and you are desperate to hire replacements so that
you do not default on some contract and have to pay penalty fees for
non-delivery of professional services. I am in a good position to take
advantage of you unless there are "government restrictions" severely penalizing
me for falsifying my professional credentials (e.g. professional license). In
both circumstances, my employment for you would not be a mutually beneficial
arrangement. In the first example I would be getting the short end of the stick
and in the second example you would be.

Many of the "restrictions" you decry came about to address the completely
unequal relationship between employers and employees going back to the dawn of
the industrial revolution. If you do not know what I am talking about, read
"The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair, read about child labor, or about the Triangle
Shirtwaist fire and the horrific sweatshop conditions that those employees had
no power to affect, etc. Your perspective is idealistic and theoretical, but
has not been shown to be accurate in practice (reference: actual history).

A willing employer and a willing employee should have no problem negotiating a
fair employment contract providing neither party wants to try to take advantage
of the other. Human nature being what it is, that circumstance is not likely to
occur reliably without some "restrictions" that try to keep both parties on the
straight and narrow.