The Regulated States of America: Occupational Licensing Gone Wild

IWB ^ | Robert Patrick Shanahan

[davikkm]

The United States is far from the land of the free these days. The governments in state capitols and Washington DC have confiscated our rights and are selling them back to us. American culture has shifted in a frightening way that has expanded the number of professions and industries that now require an occupational license to legally provide a service or start a business. This stifles business creation in many states and disproportionally affects low and middle income individuals the most.

Executive Vice President at the Goldwater Institute, Christina Sandefur, came on the Armstrong & Getty radio show earlier this week to discuss this alarming trend.

Governments have overreached yet again in requiring a license to perform work that is not in the realm of public safety for consumers. Sandefur stated how it started and what it has become today, “Okay, yeah you gotta get licensing to do something that might be really risky to public health and safety and we accept little by little and eventually we have this growing trend where people are not allowed to work or start a business at all without first getting government permission.” Our insistence on government telling us what to do has hopefully peaked, but recent examples around the country might suggest otherwise.

[Rurudyne]

Regulatory Decapture ... we need a lot of it.

[Sacajaweau]

That’s from our beginnings...hardly anything new.

[gunnyg]

The con-Con of 1787 and its results in 1789 is doing what it was intended to do!
Slowly, until lincoln came along taking the country all north, then still nothing all that abrupt till the second lincoln in 2008! w/a continuing sharp due left!
And so it goes....
GunnyG@PlanetWTF?
TRUMP.45 IF? We Can Keep Him???
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[BuffaloJack]

The regulatory Nazis are out of control.

Last summer my daughter, a recent graduate from beautician school, needed to take her licensing exam. Three hours before the exam, the state examiner texted a message to the dozen of so girls who needed to take the exam. The time had been moved up 2 hours due to some personal emergency of the examiner. When my daughter read the text, it was already a few minutes past the new testing time. She scrambled to get there, but they would not allow her in because she was 15 minutes late (for a 4 hours exam). She now has to wait until this summer to take the exam, and she can’t get a job until she is licensed.

[Responsibility2nd]

My daughter’s boyfriend operates under the radar.

He has a thriving business buying, fixing and selling used cars.

He buys and sells with an open title, he pays no taxes to the state to register these cars, he is not a licensed dealer, he does not pay exorbitant state fees to operate his business, and he pays no income tax on the profits he makes.

He may only gross two thousand a month, but he is self sufficient. And he and my daughter are healthy and happy. They enjoy life much more than many “rich” people I know.

I’m proud for them.

[factoryrat]

The administrative state IS the deep state!

[wally_bert]

I would be as well.

[SES1066]

In many areas the licensing boards are just another method to reduce competition by raising regulatory barriers to entry into their fields of business. A well known example being fought by the Institute for Justice was against Missouri Board of Cosmetology and Barber Examiners (2014) is about the right to do traditional hair-braiding without going through expensive & time-consuming cosmetology training. Given that this practice involves no chemicals nor permanent hair treatment, it appears to be a method of reducing competition through regulation.

[WayneS]

I learned a new word from that article: “mulct”

I’m not sure why I have never run across it before, but I’m glad to have encountered it today.