Occupational Licensing Blunts Competition and Boosts Inequality (economist.com)

Occupational licensing -- the practice of regulating who can do what jobs -- has been on the rise for decades. In 1950 one in 20 employed Americans required a licence to work. By 2017 that had risen to more than one in five. From a report: The trend partly reflects an economic shift towards service industries, in which licences are more common. But it has also been driven by a growing number of professions successfully lobbying state governments to make it harder to enter their industries. Most studies find that licensing requirements raise wages in a profession by around 10%, probably by making it harder for competitors to set up shop.

Lobbyists justify licences by claiming consumers need protection from unqualified providers. In many cases this is obviously a charade. Forty-one states license makeup artists, as if wielding concealer requires government oversight. Thirteen license bartending; in nine, those who wish to pull pints must first pass an exam. Such examples are popular among critics of licensing, because the threat from unlicensed staff in low-skilled jobs seems paltry. Yet they are not representative of the broader harm done by licensing, which affects crowds of more highly educated workers like Ms Varnam. Among those with only a high-school education, 13% are licensed. The figure for those with postgraduate degrees is 45%.

[...] One way of telling that many licences are superfluous is the sheer variance in the law across states. About 1,100 occupations are regulated in at least one state, but fewer than 60 are regulated in all 50, according to a report from 2015 by Barack Obama's White House. Yet a handful of high-earning professions are regulated everywhere. In particular, licences are more common in legal and health-care occupations than in any other.

Comments

Milton Friedman is right

[saloomy]

A prospective: Milton Friedman's thoughts on Licensing .

Re:Milton Friedman is right

[magarity]

Adam Smith went over this topic too except back then it was called the journeymen and masters guild system.

That's the trouble with you Americans

[Harold Halloway]

You want a capitalist free market, but only for other people.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not a problem with Americans, it's a problem with government. People in the public sector spend the majority of their time coming up with useless ways to justify their existence. There's a slow creep where governments create more oversight bodies, comities and other useless organisations which create more useless regulations. This leads to a situation where the government is wasting vast amounts of money while doing very little of value.

I think a lot of Americans would like the government to be scaled back, but once the government has set up a new department for regulating the straightness of bananas it becomes very hard to shut it down, and thus the government continues to grow out of control and the national debt continues to balloon.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Another problem with Americans is that they think the problems with their country and government are universal and fundamental, and can't be solved except by the best and brightest (i.e. Americans) despite the overwhelming number of other countries that aren't affected by equivalents of America's (for example) gun culture or business-enthralled healthcare...

A third is that this will likely be modded troll by people who don't understand that pointing out they lack context isn't just an attempt to make them feel small... yeah other cultures have this issue, but gosh y'all...

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[nctritech]

Nothing wrong with gun culture. Murder with a gun, perhaps, but gun culture is no different than any other hobby here. Non-US people and US people in large cities with ultra-strict gun control and higher rates of violent crime don't really understand that people can appreciate and enjoy guns and not be stupid with said guns. Europeans hear about high-profile mass shootings and assume that we're all blowing each others' heads off over here, but that's not the case at all. The vast majority of gun deaths in the US are suicides.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Solandri]

A capitalist free market is an excellent (arguably the best) method for searching vast solution spaces to find the most effective solution to a problem. It works. If you believe in evolution, then you also believe capitalism works. They're the same thing.

The issue here is insuring that any solutions proferred by an "expert" surpasses some minimum threshold of safety and effectiveness. Regulation accomplishes that.

The two are not incompatible. Where you get into trouble is when you believe so much in regulation that you start imposing regulations on things that haven't been tried before or hasn't proven to be a problem before - that ends up impeding the market's ability to find new innovative and unconventional solutions. e.g. the EU mandating GSM, thereby preventing EU companies from trying what turned out to be the better solution - CDMA (which turned out to be so much better that the EU had to incorporate it into the GSM spec for 3G data). Or when you believe so much in the free market that you start repealing basic regulations which have safeguarded the market against activities which had proven to be a problem in the past. e.g. the U.S. repealing the regulation separating savings banks from investment banks, thereby exacerbating the housing bubble.

This isn't an either/or choice. In fact the people presenting it as an either/or choice (on both sides) are the ones causing the problems. The licenses TFA calls a "charade" really aren't. Stylists don't just put on makeup, they can also apply caustic chemicals to your hair or skin. Likewise, bartenders mix substances which are consumed - do you really want someone merely pretending to be a bartender to mix something you'll end up drinking? Food service workers (cooks, chefs, waiters and waitresses) must pass a food handling exam for the same reason. All this is to guarantee that someone working in these fields have at least been taught basic pitfalls and mistakes to avoid.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Crashmarik]

Ha silly Euro
http://ww2live.com/en/content/...

Running Sherman Tank for sale or would you prefer a different make ?

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[i.r.id10t]

FWIW I think I ought to be able to own anything that a law enforcement agency can own. Or, if you'd rather, law enforcement agencies should be restricted to the same firearms, magazines, ammo types, etc. that I can own :)

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[HotNeedleOfInquiry]

It takes about the same amount of time to become an airline pilot as it does to become a fully licensed air conditioning technician in my state.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[mnemotronic]

... A third is that this will likely be modded troll by people who don't understand that pointing out they lack context isn't just an attempt to make them feel small... yeah other cultures have this issue, but gosh y'all...

As a certified and licensed modder and card-carrying member of the MRA (Modulators Ruffle Association) I intended to give this +1:interesting but misclicked and gave it +-0:frunobulous. Slashdot only allows a modicum of modified moderations to a more modern modality via modem. Bummer.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dwillden]

And of those 11k roughly 9k are inner city gang violence in just a few cities with strict gun controls, leaving roughly 1700 homicides for the rest of the rather large country. Add in a few hundred accidental shootings (those are dropping even as more and more guns are being sold) to round out the numbers.

Second as to your biased and incorrect claims about "assault weapons" First of all homicides using long guns of all types is usually less than 300 per year, lower than the number killed with blunt objects. Yes they get used in High profile, big news events but otherwise are very rarely used in homicides. They are not the biggest problem. Handguns account for the vast majority of firearm homicides.

Additionally regarding "Assault Weapons" That classification is based entirely on cosmetic features that do not impact their functionality. They are semi-automatic as are most firearms sold today. That means pull the trigger once and one bullet comes out. They are not automatic or burst capable. Such weapons have been tightly restricted and controlled since 1934 and since the Hughes Amendment of 1986 have become very expensive as no new automatic weapons can be sold to the public.

And yes one could argue that those other weapons could and should fall under the 2nd. Cannon certainly did. Citizens owned licensed warships and cannon. But more specifically, why shouldn't I be allowed to own them if I can use them safely? If by my negligence or intentional actions with said weapons injury or damage to others or their property occurs I would be fully liable. But if I can drive my Self Propelled Howitzer to the local public artillery range and safely send the rounds down range why not let me waste my money throwing 100 lb slugs of metal a few miles downrange? If I use it inappropriately and cause harm or damage throw the book at me.

As to Nukes (people love to bring up Nukes) they are not safe to use anywhere due to the spread of fall-out thus they are not in consideration.

No I'm not going to campaign or push for the right to own my own howitzer (I can already own one if it's a muzzle loader) but if we go back to the principle of holding people responsible for when their actions harm others why shouldn't a responsible owner be able to own one?

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dwillden]

Try four or five mass shootings. The 317 number is from the admitted propaganda site shootingtracker.com and they do not follow the established definition of Mass shooting: 4 or more non-family fatalities. If you stick to the long used FBI definition we are getting about four or five such horrible events a year, out of over 100 million gun owners. . Even left leaning, anti-gun MotherJones.com has called them out on their falsely inflated numbers.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[_Sharp'r_]

In Arizona, it takes more hours of education to become a licensed hair stylist than it does to become an EMT. It's crazy. Currently the legislature is trying to at least exempt people who only wash hair from the hair stylist license, but the State cosmetology board is fighting them on it. 1,000 hours of education to wash hair!

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Gaxx]

Sorry - I don't buy the evolution analogy. There's elements of it that match but here's the issue. In a free market, companies don't 'evolve' to innovate. Innovation isn't the end goal, surviving and profiting is. There's a hell of a lot of ways to profit other than innovation and innovation is always a risky strategy to reach that end. Often it's easier to make a measured approach and plan to drag down anyone else who innovates, especially once you're big enough.

A free market is about the profitability and survival being the end goal and whatever achieves that is what happens. This is why licensing is required, to ensure that people don't get trampled underfoot on the way to that profitability.

As Solandri stated, licensing applies to people who could endanger your wellbeing through incompetence or negligence and we all benefit from that. You _could_ argue that people can vote with their feet, avoid restaurants that develop a reputation for food poisoning etc. Noone wants to be one of the ones who dies on the way to building that reputation, though.

Re: That's the trouble with you Americans

[luis_a_espinal]

How about licensed hair stylists?

They did mention a few specifically: make up artists, hair stylists, cabinet making, to name some of the top of my head.

I'm on the fence on this. Hair styling can be a vector of disease if you don't clean your tools well. Then there's the issue of how difficult getting one really is. There's some math test requirements to get the license in some states... and many people simply fail to pass them, which then ask the question "why do I need this to get a license to cut hair."

But then I know people from other countries that pass the test and go the license because for them it was pretty much elementary school math.

So, in the case of hair styling, is it really licensing that is hurting, or is it people's inability to answer elementary school level questions?

And how do we propose that hair stylists conduct the proper hygienic procedures to run such an establishment? And how do we test them on a regular basis without a license?

Licenses can be a hindrance in some areas. In others, they are a hindrance with a public service purpose.

In other words, surprise, shit ain't always black and white.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[AmiMoJo]

If you believe in evolution, then you also believe capitalism works.

Evolution is brutal though. It works by the weakest members of the population dying before they can reproduce. Okay, it's a bit more complicated but it's not a process that produces good outcomes for a lot of individuals.

That's why most capitalist societies also have regulation and welfare.

I suppose you could say that capitalism is the baseline, a system that works but which is not very desirable.

e.g. the EU mandating GSM

Actually a great counter example. We don't have the horrendous network lock-in that the US does. European phones are more compatible with the rest of the world. In the US capitalism found the best way to screw the customer and maximise profits, not the best technical solution.

If you want the best tech then Japan and South Korea are both heavily regulated but also way ahead of Europe and the US.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dcw3]

...aren't affected by equivalents of America's (for example) gun culture ...

Besides being off-topic (but since you went there), what "gun culture" are you speaking of? You can go about your business in the U.S., as the vast majority of the population does, and outside of police and security guards, or video games and TV, it's extremely unlikely that you'll see or hear a gun...likely for months or years, unless you make an effort to do so. Sure there are exceptions in certain gang infested, crime ridden areas. And I say this having lived through the '67 riots in Detroit, and being a gun owner for 40+ years, "gun culture"?...no...inability to deal with our mentally ill, substance abusers, and others who should never get access to guns...most certainly. FWIW, I'm disappointed that no action has been taken to prevent access to bump-stocks...there's no legitimate use for them, and would support reasonable legislation on gun control in general.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dcw3]

Yes, to all...

If I want a tank, can I have one?

https://www.cnbc.com/2014/07/1...

An RPG?

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=rpg+for+s...

Cannon?

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=cannon+fo...

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dcw3]

So, ~300,000,000 million people need to give up their right to defend themselves because ~.0001% of them are fuck ups, instead of dealing with those individuals. While those mass shootings are tragic, Also, 317 is a lie...

"Between 1966 and 2012, there were 90 such incidents in the U.S."
https://fivethirtyeight.com/fe...

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dcw3]

The EPA enacted nearly 4,000 regulations during the previous administration. You're telling us that that's all necessary? Bullshit.

How about federal agencies monitoring individuals w/o a warrant, I suppose you're okay with that, and that it's not overreach.

How about the government telling women they can't have an abortion, or that adults can't smoke pot, or gays (for many years) can't get married? Or that screwing anyone but your wife in any position other than missionary would land you in jail.

People in power want more power, and always will. That's why we need term limits, and to put serious controls on lobbyists.

Re: That's the trouble with you Americans

[coofercat]

By that logic, you're also on the fence for people such as:

- road sweepers
- dog walkers
- bird owners/breeders
- cat owners/breeders
- pretty much anyone who has a rodent pet
- gun owners
- delivery drivers (even small vehicles such as mopeds/bicycles)
- any sort of entertainment venue (especially if kids of any age go there)
- sysadmins
- programmers

The list goes on - all these roles have some associated public risk if they chose to do the role badly/incorrectly/illegally. Should they all require a license to operate at all though? Wouldn't a single law addressing "doing harm to others" cover it all, and mean zillions of professions can operate without licenses?

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[lgw]

Sorry - I don't buy the evolution analogy.

That's because you misunderstand it. Allow me to explain.

In a free market, companies don't 'evolve' to innovate. Innovation isn't the end goal, surviving and profiting is.

Individuals of a species don't evolve either. Survival and reproduction is their goal. Evolution is something that a population does. Just as the statistical distribution of alleles in a population changes over time, the statistical distribution of business practices in a market changes over time. E.g. the slow fade of brick-and-mortar stores in many sectors.

A free market is about the profitability and survival being the end goal and whatever achieves that is what happens.

So, yeah, just like nature.

licensing applies to people who could endanger your wellbeing through incompetence or negligence

Everyone you meet could endanger your wellbeing through incompetence or negligence. Some people do want to license all human interaction, just like there are some anarchists, but reasonable people just want professional licensing to exist only where there's some risk of harm significantly beyond normal activities.

Licensing an electrician: makes sense to most people. Someone braiding hair: not so much. So, it's possible to have too much licensing, and thus the discussion of how much is too much is a reasonable one without a simple answer.

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[Ungrounded Lightning]

I don't see a problem with allowing guns, but I don't see the reason to allow assault weapons. If I want a tank, can I have one? An RPG? Cannon?

The guys who fought the revolution that led to their leaders writing and approving the Bill of Rights used personally-owned cannon and personally-owned warships in the war - which was the peak military technology of the time. Many of the foot-soldiers' long guns were rifled, and higher-tech than the muskets of their opponents.

They'd just fought a revolution against the "legitimate government", and were doing their best to make it possible to repeat this exercise if their new roll-your-own government also got out of hand. So why SHOULDN'T the citizens have AT LEAST the firepower of the government forces? And why SHOULDN'T the government be banned from preventing this? (And why SHOULDN'T the citizens be expeected to take moves by the government to disarm them as the key evidence that it HAD gotten out of hand?)

Meanwhile, do you know what an "assault weapon" is? How about an "assault rifle"?

An "assault rifle" is a military term for a small (easy to carry and get get through small openings with it), select-fire (switch between single-shot and burst and/or continuous fire), low caliber weapon, designed to wound. (Kill an opposing soldier and you take one out of the fight. Wound one and you take out him, his buddy, a medic, ... And you have fewer relatives that hate your country once peace is achieved.) In some states the single-action "plowshared" versioins are illegal for hunting - because they're too underpowered and lead to the animal suffering a long time rather than dying quickly.

An "assault weapon" is a term of legal art in anti-gun laws. It varies by state. But generally it means "ugly military-looking one-shot-per-trigger-pull gun with some arbitrary collection of features that sound scary, and we'll call it something that people will confuse with a low-power infantry rifle that can burst-fire."

Re:That's the trouble with you Americans

[dcw3]

Okay, so you're technically correct, but I would argue that the AMA, and ABA, and a few other licensed professional organizations are virtual unions, pushing the same thing.

My kid's friends did cosmology

[rsilvergun]

there are multiple tiers of the license. How much you need depends on what chemicals you work with. If you're a dude (most of us /.ers are) you have no idea how crazy some of chemicals they work with are. The stuff women will do to get straight hair if they're born with curly or curly hair if they're born with straight is absurd. Come to think of it, every girl I've ever met wants the opposite type of hair they were born with...

I think the rise of licenses isn't just mean spirited folks wanting to raise wages. It's got more to do with computers making it easy to track folks and wide spread mass media leading to more people hearing stories of what happens when somebody without training does something dangerous. If it's one thing that 20 years in the workforce has taught me it's that companies do as little training as humanly possible.

Re:My kid's friends did cosmology

[Hognoxious]

There is a theory that most regulations and red tape are unnecessary - we should rely on common sense.

There's another which states that most regulations and red tape are there because common sense is actually quite rare and someone did something stupid.

Re:My kid's friends did cosmology

[Mal-2]

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Re:My kid's friends did cosmology

[Richard_at_work]

Or rather, someone did something deliberate which was stupid - such as using a non-human-grade product because it was cheaper than the human-grade one and burned someones scalp off.

That's the main reason things tend to end up licensed - illegal behavior on the part of the unlicensed actor.

Re:My kid's friends did cosmology

[ShanghaiBill]

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

If we allow cosmologists to be unlicensed, the entire universe could collapse into a black hole. There is some evidence that this is already happening. That is far worse than a bad haircut.

To help out

[Kohath]

If you want to help solve this, donate to the Institute for Justice. They are the most prominent organization fighting "license to be employed" laws.

Re:To help out

[Kohath]

Likewise, prior to licensing, people were allowed to sell all manner of literal snake oil as medicine...

That's the general argument, yes. You can't get rid of a single legal requirement on anything, no matter how ridiculous it is, because then you'd repeal all legal requirements on everything.

No. You wouldn’t. You'd keep the few that you need and repeal the rest. And then see how it goes. And then add a couple back or repeal a couple more based on the results just like any other intelligent people would if they were trying to serve their society instead of themselves.

Re:Bartending = makeup artists?

[viperidaenz]

The one who wields a brush applies dangerous chemicals to peoples faces.

Re:Bartending = makeup artists?

[Kohath]

The latter makes perfect sense to license or oversee in some way or another.

Why? The guy at the 7-eleven who rings up your beer purchase isn't licensed. Home brewers aren't licensed. A friend who has you over for a couple beers isn't licensed.

People have been drinking beer and for thousands of years without government meddling. Other than the government collecting a fee and employing a professional meddler, how is it different or better with government meddling?

Merit is what keeps everything good working

[AHuxley]

That engineer has to be able to prove their bridge will work over time for the use it was designed for, in the conditions it was built.
Giving away the word "engineer" to someone with no skills for "equality" reasons will not result in a bridge that works long term.
Nations need to have confidence in the bridges they use.
Need medical care? the doctor, any doctor in any hospital should have passed that nations medical exams and be under constant review and have their results look at.
A medical system needs to have confidence that any on duty doctor can do what they got a job for.
A rescue helicopter to get people to hospital that can fly day and night needs the crew to actually be able to fly in day and night conditions.
A person working on a production like and its electoral system needs to be able to show they have the skills to work on that system.
That "licence" tells the factory owner, the insurance company and all other workers the work done is to a nations standards and was correct and safe.
That any further work can build on existing quality work.
The electrical, water, gas networks have to be designed and installed to some standard so all surrounding homes are safe to some standard for many years.

Re:Bartending = makeup artists?

[Anonymous Coward]

It keeps the equipment sanitary. I don't want my beer strained through the brewer's wife's old unwashed stockings.

In other words, because of the profit motive, people will take shortcuts and cheat at the expense of the consumer - even if it kills them.

The Libertarian fairy tale is that the Free Markets (all be Praised Hallelujah!) will take care of it. Folks will realize the bad behavior and not give them business anymore.

One, people are stupid. Read 5 star reviews on Amazon and you'll see folks are too nice. "I got the package! FIVE stars!!!"

Two, so I put road kill into your hot dogs - tainted with motor oil and other crap - but it tastes good and you don't notice.

A-Okay! Right?!

Sue?!? Really? DO you know that ALL dietary supplement companies are frauds? Thanks to Orin Hatch (R-Utah), the FDA has the burden of prrof if one of those worthless products don't work - and none do.

I can stuff a gelantin capsule with confectioners sugar and call it anything I want and charge $$$$$$, claim what I want (with a legalease disclaimer) and the FDA is the one that has to prove its bogus.

And thanks to the Republicans - ONLY the Republicans - the FDA doesn't have the money to do any enforecement on the fraudulent dietray supplement industry.

Thanks to Orin Hatch (R- retard of Utah-Moron kooks)

The Republicans have enabled fraud and poisoning by industry.

Blame the guilds

[quonset]

What guilds you ask? Way back when, anyone could claim to be a bread maker, or tanner, or brewer. At some point, due to various reasons, those who took pride in their work and felt their standard of excellence should be met by the shyster down the stall banded together and formed guilds.

Those guilds set minimum standards for quality such as no sawdust in bread or beer which wasn't watered down or had spices thrown in to cover up bad tastes or bad alcohol.

Fast forward to today and for somewhat similar reasons, professions want people to meet minimum standards of service. For example, the person who colors your hair should have some basic knowledge of how not to burn your skin or turn your hair into straw when applying the mixed chemicals.

Now I know what many of you are going to say. "I'm a programmer and I've never been involved in a guild or union or anything like them. Employers simply hire me."

Oh really? Those employers never asked what your qualifications were? Never asked how many years experience you had in python or Rust or whatever language they're looking for? They never asked to see examples of your work? Never quizzed you on your knowledge?

What they did is no different than what people being licensed go through. You have to meet some minimum standard set by the employer in the same manner someone has to meet the minimum standard to be a cosmetologist, an attorney or doctor.

To those who say, "Free markets!", what happens when your scalp is burned getting your hair colored? What if the person, somehow, gets the wash in your eyes and causes damage? Your response is most likely to get an attorney to sue them for damages. Question: how do you know that attorney is qualified to handle your case?

Definitely a problem with American government.

[fyngyrz]

People in the public sector spend the majority of their time coming up with useless ways to justify their existence.

The thing you didn't mention explicitly is that coming up with these things is not useless to them.

Unless a way can be found to make it so, they'll keep doing it, and their power extends strongly downward, while ours extends upwards in a very weak and diffused manner. Even that may be an illusion; the number of non-establishment legislators who are willing to reform the various agencies with regulatory power are few indeed: we can't seem to get out of the two-party imposed oligarchy at all.

So I checked my state's bartending licensing.

[hey!]

You're required to pass a test on how to recognize fake ids, determine if someone has had too much to drink and needs to be shut off, and what your legal responsibilities and liabilities are as a server. The permit cost is $8.99, and includes a video tutorial.

That seems pretty reasonable to me. It's not like they're testing you on whether you can mix a Martini.

Re:There seem to be 3 kinds of licenses out there

[Actually, I do RTFA]

you need a license to be a tour guide or a carpenter. (also a thing in some jurisdictions)

Areas where tourism is a big industry obviously are going to want to license tour guides. Bad tour guides can give a destination a bad reputation or lead to tourists getting ripped off or mugged. Much like a hotel wants to maintain a level of service, tourist destinations do as well. Some places also have a healthy respect for their history and want to make sure it is accurately represented.

Carpenters frame houses. I've seen a badly framed house. I've seen a ceiling collapse due to poor carpentry. Why you think being able to build to code shouldn't require a test is beyond me.

Re:Merit, yes. License tests, no.

[aaarrrgggh]

Professional Electrical Engineer here... No, being licensed doesn't mean you are good, but it does serve to keep a very high percentage of people that are not good out. It also places responsibility and pressure on young engineers to know their shit.

Federal-level licensing for most fields makes more sense though. Structural engineering is the obvious exception; geotechnical might be as well.

Re: Milton Friedman is shite

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Given the prevalence of autocorrect, it is no longer possible to distinguish a typo from choosing an incorrect but similar word.

Re: Who does the licensing?

[c6gunner]

You're confusing two different concepts. Certifications aren't licences. In a field which requires a license you cannot legally work unless you have it. Whereas in IT I do not NEED an MCSE "license" in order to play minesweeper or solitaire; I'm just more likely to be hired by a pointy haired boss if I have the certification.

Distinction

[JBMcB]

At some point you are correct. There are certain professions that should require licensing. Generally these are professions that involve some level of personal safety (medical) or fiduciary responsibility (legal.)

At some point your argument falls apart. Not exactly sure why you need to be licensed to:

Decorate a house
Braid hair (NOT cut it)
Walk dogs
Sell caskets
Be a locksmith
Run a pawn broker
Run a flower shop
Operate a food truck (ON TOP of your regular commercial drivers license AND health certificate)
Install home theater equipment
Run a travel agency
Package things for shipping
Upholster furniture

I'm sure you could come up with some corner case that would involve safety in any of these cases, but you could do the same for, pretty much, ANY profession.

So the question becomes is if the licensing scheme is doing more to protect consumers, or to protect established professionals from competition.

No need to be flippant about bartenders and MUAs

[richardtallent]

As someone who has been involved in fashion, art, and glamour photography for some time, I find the article's dismissal of cosmetology licensing to be careless and poorly researched.

Applying makeup is a licensed activity because of significant health and safety issues related to hygiene and proper use of certain products (such as latex, for example, as used in the movie and theater industries). You could very literally lose an eye, go into anaphylactic shock, or get a nasty rash because some village idiot decided to play makeup artist and didn't know what they were doing. People doing this really DO need to know what they are doing.

Likewise, bartender licenses are less about memorizing obscure drink recipes and more about properly working within the law around alcoholic drinks and potentially inebriated customers. These licenses are not a burden to obtain (working with a non-profit art gallery, we obtained them for some of our board members so we could legally serve wine at our shows), and they are a serious intervention to help cut down on drunk driving, alcohol poisoning, and underage drinking.

Here in Texas, the licensing agency recently got rid of mandatory licensing of interior designers (my wife is one) and talent/modeling agencies (which, again, I'm familiar with through photography). The result is a total disaster in both fields. To do an effective job, interior designers need to understand building codes, proper construction techniques, when to call in a structural engineer, permitting, blueprints and drawings, special laws around commercial furniture, etc. But without a license, anyone who watches a bunch of HGTV and thinks they are the next Joanna Gaines can go represent themselves as a designer, and homeowners and businesses *don't know what they don't know*. And in the talent agency world, particularly in modeling, there is a HUGE problem of outright scams, not to mention sketchy guys claiming to "manage" models or singers, who act more like wannabe pimps.

So yeah, maybe licensing can be a bit of a protection racket in some industries, but it's way too easy to deride someone else's education from a place of ignorance about the service they are performing and the risks involved in the decisions they make.

(Also, make no mistake, this article isn't about makeup or pints of lager, it's about an ongoing, long-term, well-funded dispute about what the differences should be between a doctor and a nurse practitioner. The arguments about other industries are merely window-dressing.)

Re:No need to be flippant about bartenders and MUA

[mvdwege]

You're missing the point: the article is basically the standard neo-Liberal (for US readers: Libertarian) propaganda piece you'd expect from The Economist.

While not as bad as Koch-funded think tanks, on economy their stance is virtually the same: take away all worker protections and let the owner class run Gilded Age style rampant.

Certification vs. Licensing.

[mi]

Is there a difference between a license and certification?

There is and there is not. Per se, there is nothing wrong with certification — whereby someone else attests, that you know and/or are skilled at some field.

Licensing is the government turning a right, which only the Judicial branch can revoke upon successful prosecution by the Executive for violating Legislature-issued laws, into a mere privilege, which the Executive can deny or withdraw on a whim.

The concepts often work together and so are easily confused:

• When the government bans anyone without a certification to work in a field.
• When the only certification acceptable under the above ban are those issued by the government or the government-approved bodies.

Such requirements deprive us of rights. According to TFA, they also make us less efficient, but I don't think that ought to matter — because the rights are more important, even if the efficiency actually improved.

Re:Family Doc

[bluefoxlucid]

Pharmacists are important. Don't underestimate them.

Re:No need to be flippant about bartenders and MUA

[Reziac]

I don't disagree; it's good to have some verification of the expected qualifications. But it needs to be applied sanely. Last time this subject came up, I looked up my state's list of licensed professions (outside of engineering and medicine), and requirements thereto. Most were sane enough -- some 50-60 hours of training for the more-basic jobs, a bit more for the more-complex.

And then there was the weird outlier -- a requirement of 1100 hours of training for (IIRC) physical trainer. And I was like, WTF? Did someone take such a dislike to the profession as to effectively prohibit it??