[ RadSafe ] RadSafe Digest, Vol 367, Issue 1

[garyi at trinityphysics.com]

Come ON Mike!  Are you really going to say you think this is plausible?  If it is common 
knowledge, the law will stop it.  If it isn't, there is no "undermining" to worry about.  

Lets turn the question around.  All of us have had car inspections, so how many have been 
offered a "deal"?  I suggest that corruption in the car inspection market will be greater than 
that in the x-ray inspection market, because mechanics are notoriously untrustworthy and for 
other socioeconomic reasons.  And yet we (at least I) have not heard or read about the great 
car inspection problem (that would be "Tailgate" for all you political hacks).  So it does not 
seem reasonable to pressume a problem in the x-ray inspection market.

-Gary Isenhower

> On 29 Jul 2010 at 14:20, Brennan, Mike  (DOH) wrote:
> 
> Hi, Gary.  
> 
> I am glad you don't see rampant corruption, and I hope you never do.  I
> am even willing to stipulate that in a small "market" like x-ray
> inspection there may be enough oversight that it may not happen.  
> 
> Please note that be as blatant as bribes for the system to be
> undermined.  Let's use your example of private contractors doing auto
> exhaust inspections.  If the word gets out that cars that don't pass at
> Clean Air Inspections do pass at Keep 'er Rolling Inspections, who do
> you think will do the most inspections, and make the most money?  And if
> the number of inspection shops keeps going up, and the resources of the
> oversight agency keeps going down, how long before someone does their
> own informal risk/benefit analysis and decides to fudge the rules in
> order to make a little more money (especially if they don't think the
> rules are that important to begin with)?  
>