The Aura of Legitimacy

日期:2012/06/05

I recently visited a Dr. and when I got there, the nurse asked me to fill out a computer questionnaire that took 1 hour to fill out. After I filled it out, I was asked to sign a statement that said such things as "you will not be paid for filling out this questionnaire, the contents might be used by commercial factors, there are unlimited people in the survey" and a hundred other things that gave it a false aura of legitimacy.

I am wondering to what extent the false aura of legitimacy pervades our field. The classic example is the elections in a marxist or democratic regime, or the government institution that's there ostensibly to protect you from harming yourself but is really a gate for preventing competition from small and new entrants into the field. The committees in the markets to maintain order and proper pricing that are really arenas for the members to mark the positions in their favor, and force out the non-members through margin changes and rule changes comes to mind. The rules against competition in all fields, the licensing requirements, and for example the ethics tests that one must pass in certain fields. How pervasive is this and what is the relevance to our field?