Big Government: Occupational Licensing Requirements

Land Of Regulated Opportunity

If it is true that “Over the past 50 years, the number of American workers required to have a government license has risen from 5 to 30 percent of the workforce” (Source: Goldwater Institute, Phoenix, AZ), then this is substantial evidence for big government overreach.

Occupational Licensing Is Servitude By Other Means

As a principle, occupational licensing should be optional for most professions. Professional licensing or training can serve individuals to distinguish themselves from their competitors. That’s an individual’s decision in a free market economy. It should not be mandated by government as the typical one size fits all solution. Customers are not that stupid as not to be able to distinguish reputable from shady businesses. Moreover, occupational licensing requirements are too often capricious, excessive, and ridiculous.

Big government and their lobbyists just get out of the way.

Barriers To Entry For Whom?

Government mandated occupational licensing requirements are often nothing but veiled protectionism granted by politicians to influential businesses or labor to degrade competition. Do not governments benefit from the constant flow of licensing fees?

For further reading:

“License to Work: A National Study of Burdens from Occupational Licensing” by the Institute for Justice published in May 2012 (http://ij.org/licensetowork)