The Personal Trainers Liberation Army
Sorry to be snarky, but having gotten crosswise of my battle against licensing requirements, I felt the need to rebuke Freddie here.
UPDATE:
In a followup post, Freddie writes:
Almost all of what Conor is addressing is a straw man, of course, as I never proposed close to what he’s suggesting I did, and most of it doesn’t follow logically at all. The idea that, perhaps, we should have regulatory standards if you want to call yourself a licensed personal trainer doesn’t even come close to suggesting that everyone needs a personal trainer to work out, that everyone who wants to be paid to show other people how to work out would need to be licensed, or that Congress would sit around writing regulations themselves. (Does Conor think the House is actually performing drug trials in their spare time, because they theoretically empower the FDA?) The failure is in the fact that people want to go to personal trainers who have some sort of license, and personal trainers want to be licensed to do better business, and yet the lack of clear standards on even a state-wide basis makes this impossible for both and invites abuse from unscrupulous people.
Obviously Freddie doesn’t actually want to require everyone who works out to get a personal trainer. I raised that point in my sarcastic rebuttal to demonstrate the flawed standard that Freddie is using to justify government intervention. As he wrote in his original post calling for federal licensing of personal trainers:
…as it’s an issue of protecting people from actual physical harm, I don’t think its passage would signal some sort of creep towards a nightmare regulatory state. Incidentally, regulations that protect people from bodily harm are what a lot of people actually want most from government, and expect most from government…
Couldn’t exactly the same reasoning be applied to a requirement that exercisers make use of a trained guide when lifting weights in a gym or training for a marathon? We’d all agree that would be a signal of creep toward a nightmare regulatory state, because we’re used to professional licensing now, while we’re not use to what I facetiously proposed.
And I maintain that were a federal law to be passed on this matter, members of Congress would have to study and write guidelines that set forth what exactly personal trainers should know, who exactly is qualified to teach them, how those teachers are licensed, etc. How does Freddie propose to pass federal legislation on this matter without involving the legislature?
Finally, if the failure in Freddie’s view is merely that “people want to go to personal trainers who have some sort of license, and personal trainers want to be licensed to do better business,” I fail to see why this requires the federal government to mandate the licensing of all personal trainers. Though I’d prefer no federal involvement full stop, why doesn’t Freddie advocate that the government sign off on some standard, issue certificates to those who voluntarily want to prove that they’ve met them, and leave it at that? Better yet, why doesn’t he simply call for some other non-governmental body to do this same thing — preferably a body that has greater expertise in setting standards than the government?
Freddie concludes:
…conservatives love to rail against bad regulations because it’s easy; find one or two examples of poorly conceived or implemented regulations, and the posts write themselves. It’s a much different thing when you’re actually governing, and people are being injured and killed because of a lack of enforceable standards. But then there again we see the context in which these debates operate. As liberalism is the default ruling ideology of the United States, conservatives don’t actually have to govern, merely critique. And my liberal peers are more than happy to go about the business of actually making society work.
Another way to put this is that Freddie’s liberal peers are more than happy to pass licensing requirements in all sorts of fields where there isn’t any need for them — barbers, interior designers, high school teachers, and now apparently yoga teachers and personal trainers — because their wrongheaded view of government presumes it is the moral responsibility of the legislature to intervene in any voluntary transaction that might result in an injury, so much so that legislative action is demanded without even stopping to ponder whether the law in question is constitutional, or whether on balance it does more harm than good, or whether it favors the affluent and overburdens the poor and unconnected, or whether the state has any business inserting itself in the voluntary behavior at issue.
So yes, it is easy for conservatives to rail against these things. There is a reason for that: it is the odiousness of the requirements at issue, demonstrable across all sorts of industries, and yet insufficient to overcome the left’s ideological predisposition for inserting government into any worldly arena where outcomes are short of perfection.
I was struck by this bit of Freddie’s post:
people are being injured and killed because of a lack of enforceable standards
If in a transaction between A and B, B gets hurt or killed by A’s incompetent actions, the primary fault rests with A, at least in the typical case. Perhaps enforceable standards could have prevented it at an acceptable cost, but it’s a stretch (and the sort of stretch that leads to ever more gov’t involvement) to say the harm is because of the lack of regulation.
— kenb · Jul 12, 01:33 AM · #
Government certifications are the wrongest, most corruption-prone way for government to protect consumers. After seeing how “certified organic” systems work for food growers, I’m not even sure that I like the idea of voluntary government standards.
— The Reticulator · Jul 12, 04:37 AM · #
If you find it unacceptable that governments should establish and enforce commercial standards, blame the raving liberals of thirteenth century England, who in 1215 forced King John to sign the Magna Carta, with this clause
The idea that government should regulate certain commercial terms to ensure they adhere to an agreed-upon meaning has such a long history that ascribing it to the baneful influence of the modern Left, or invoking the spectre of regulatory creep, seems a bit inaccurate. Please note that regulating commercial standards does not mean regulating all transactions. If you meet someone on the playground who offers to help you with your jump-shot, you take your chances on their expertise, just as you take your chance on the size of the glass when you buy at a kids’ lemonade stand. But my take on Freddy’s comment suggests that if a person introduces themselves as a certified personal trainer, the government has a legitimate role in ensuring those words, and that certificate, mean something, just as governments ensure that when the corner store sells you a quart of milk, the word quart means 946.35 SI millilitres, not 800 or 600. Since governments have played this role since at least the thirteenth century, it hardly seems a stretch to suggest they regulate the meaning of the word “certified”, especially with people’s health at stake.
— John Spragge · Jul 12, 07:31 AM · #
Freddie and Conor both would benefit from looking at the rise of the LMT and the subsequent rise of all manner of unlicensed “body work”.
The history of the regulation of cinema is also instructive.
— Tony Comstock · Jul 12, 11:03 AM · #
To be fair I was surprised when I googled “personal trainer certification” at the number of certification bodies there are. Apparently accreditation programs can now being accredited by larger accredited programs.
— Dylan · Jul 12, 04:06 PM · #
I feel like Freddie’s point is worth repeating – the whole argument against regulation and certification is a disingenuous one so long as conservatives continue to prove themselves unable and unwilling to govern.
I do want to ask you that, Conor. How far short of perfection must outcomes fall before government can justly insert itself into that activity? I presume there’s a specific number of injuries or deaths that you have in mind.
— Chet · Jul 12, 07:42 PM · #
Chet writes: “I feel like Freddie’s point is worth repeating – the whole argument against regulation and certification is a disingenuous one so long as conservatives continue to prove themselves unable and unwilling to govern.”
I beg to differ.
Regulation and certification either is or isn’t good public policy in any given field. If it isn’t good public policy, then Democrats shouldn’t enact it when they are in power, even if Republicans are in the political wilderness, and the biggest bunch of dopes in American history besides.
— Conor Friedersdorf · Jul 12, 11:33 PM · #
Conor, Freddie: How do you two feel about Rolfing? How about Reiki?
— Tony Comstock · Jul 12, 11:47 PM · #
How about unrated flims vs. MPAA rated films?
— Tony Comstock · Jul 13, 12:10 AM · #
Is there any field where conservatives feel regulation and certification is good public policy? That’s sort of the problem. (I notice you refused to answer that question.) Conservatives are opposed to all regulation; or if not all, well, they’re opposed any time we actually want to do it.
Which is a pretty convenient position for them to take, since they can’t govern. It’s always academic for you.
— Chet · Jul 13, 03:21 AM · #
As a licensed professional, I must protest, Conor. I think you are taking a reasonable criticism of licensure — sometimes accreditation is merely a matter of joining the right organization — versus its value in consumer protection. In my own profession, holding a clinical license allows mental health professionals to be held accountable. Without it, any hack with a shelf full of Oprah-endorsed self-help books can style him or herself a therapist or “life coach” and charge the desperate and gullible $150 an hour to listen to them kvetch without helping the client reach actual insight or develop a treatment plan, thus leaving, say, a mother with post-partum depression to go untreated and up and kill her child.
Similarly, with beauticians (for example), a licensed beautician is subject to periodic inspections for standards of health and safety, as well as continuing education in evolving practices. Perhaps you recall that rash of flesh-eating bacteria that was spread in the Bay Area by unlicensed nail salons?
In an ideal society, caveat emptor would be sufficient. But unfortunately, we don’t live in an ideal society — people are dumb, impulsive, or negligent, and that can have serious externalities for the public health and safety.
— Erik Vanderhoff · Jul 13, 06:18 PM · #