Bankruptcy grace period

[Justin Schwartz]

People talk about professionalization and regulation of law and medicine 
like it's a bad thing. Look, the situation with crooked, incompetent, and 
indifferent lawyers and doctors is bad enough as it is, even with 
regulation. But these are real disciplines that require mastry of complex 
bodies of material. Moreover, unlike academics, there is a real cost to real 
human beings if it's badly done--well, I don't mean to discount the 
interests of students, but in fact in much of academics that isn't a 
consideration; I meant research. If you go to a quack doctor, you may get 
rooked or die. If you go to a charlatan  "attorney," you may lose your 
money, or your house, or go to jail. I see what happens when people 
represent themselves, sometimes with the "help" of friends. 
Occassionally--very occasionally--they do a creditable job, better than some 
of the loser lawyers who practice before the courts. Mostly they blow 
everything, and can only be rescued if a sympathetic judge or clerk puts in 
more time than she ought to pull something from the wreckage. Without 
regulation and the guild mentality, there would be a lot more of that. So, 
guild mentality? You bet. --jks


>
>>>From: John Mage <jmage at panix.com>
>>>
>>>Justin, speaking as a lawyer who has on several occasions practiced in
>>>bankruptcy court, advising folks to file for bankruptcy is NOT the
>>>unauthorized practice of law. It's what good friends do for each other.
>>
>>Yeah, really. Justin, you may have come to the field of law late,
>>but you've certainly wasted no time developing a lawyer's guild
>>mentality.
>>
>>Carl
>
>That's how any profession maintains its price of labor-power:
>gate-keeping.  Doctors do it, professors do it, accountants do it.
>Professional gate-keeping is most often practiced through state
>licensing. In the case of university professors, gate-keeping is
>maintained by peer reviews & "apprenticeship."  All cases call for
>advanced learning, access to which is narrowed by standardized exams
>& "weed-out courses."
>
>In return for publicly sanctioned monopolies, professionals are
>supposed to serve "clients," instead of gouging "customers" all they
>can -- sometimes charging standardized fees, instead of wildly
>fluctuating prices directly determined by supply & demand; to eschew
>advertising; to uphold high standards of ethics & competence; and so
>on.  :-)
>
>Yoshie

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