One of the many reforms in the Affordable Care Act is a provision allowing certain non-dentists to perform low-level dentistry tasks. Dentists don’t like this because the cartelization of dentistry services increases dentist incomes (you can read about how this works here, here, and here.) The Wall Street Journal reports on the dentist lobby (the American Dental Association), its determination to repeal that part of Obamacare, and its vast power in general. This quote was particularly chilling:
>I am sure they’re very good at it:
Dentists actually are highly skilled professionals, and creating laws requiring either that a dentist or somebody working for a dentist clean your teeth needlessly drives up the price. The ADA may favor rent-seeking regulations, but I’m sure many dentists would trade less income for a restructuring of their jobs that would enable them to concentrate on high-level dentristry rather than low-level monotony.
