Overregulation across a number of business industries remains a controversial issue for the American people. From new financial standards that harm big businesses to regulating new security measures felt at all levels of society, growing government involvement makes even the simplest tasks difficult for many average citizens.
Luckily, one member of Congress, former North Carolina Speaker of the House and U.S. Senator Thom Tillis, serves the American people with a number of hard-hitting ideas that can take care of the real issues plaguing our daily lives.
According to recent remarks made by Tillis, making restaurant workers wash their hands before leaving the bathroom is a sign of regulation gone overboard. He believes that restaurants should be able to opt-out of the regulation as long as they make it clearly marked that the employees are not required to wash hands.
No really — of all of the regulations he could take issue with — he said that. Because apparently enforcing basic common sense health standards in restaurants is more important to discuss than any of the other issues that affect our nation as a whole.
Despite being the butt of many jokes in recent days, Tillis deserves a high-five for his unwavering commitment to limiting big-government. Though based on his hand-washing proposal it might be best to avoid that. Tillis does make a point to clarify that he would not personally eat at a restaurant that has opted out of the hand-washing practices. The market, he feels, would adjust accordingly and most likely drive out the businesses that do not abide by socially accepted health standards.
Tillis argues that the government should not be the reason employees wash hands. The fear of losing customers and ultimately going out of business because customers fear a disregard for safety standards should be. But the problem with his idea comes in the fact that it passes all risks on to consumers, rather than to the restaurants themselves.
In 2013, an All American Grill in North Carolina gave salmonella to 100 of its customers. The health department identified lack of employee sanitation as the most likely cause of the outbreak. In this case, the market did not take care of any safety risks involved. The ill costumers ultimately paid the price in the absence of restaurant employee sanitation. That is not market efficiency, but an unnecessary health risk that could be avoided with the current non-intrusive hand washing standards.
Yes, overregulation does threaten to stifle innovation, profit and ease of living daily life in America. But Tillis’ comments provide a perfect launching point to an issue larger than the regulation of hand washing. Growing reliance on ideology has driven our politicians to propose an ever-increasing list of nonsense ideas that violate common sense in favor of grabbing headlines and appeasing the most radical on both sides of the political spectrum. Politicians such as Tillis who choose to ignore real issues should make the American population sicker than a restaurant with no hand washing policies.