Michigan citizens licensed through the state (there are 750,000 of them) recently got an email from the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs “seeking your input to identify requirements that make the process of obtaining a license challenging.” People can take a survey asking them to suggest “any law, rule or process changes” that would make things easier.

As someone who has worked in a variety of licensed fields and done deep research in the field, I have some suggestions.

1. The department should regularly review the 180 occupational licenses in Michigan. These should be strictly evaluated based on how much the license actually protects public health and safety. The Mackinac Center published a study detailing a model review process for how to do this and specifically applied it to a few current licenses.

2. Automatically recognize licensed workers from other states. Many occupations are in an interstate-recognition compact. In other jobs, people can move into Michigan and apply to have their licenses recognized. This process should be much, much easier. The state should automatically recognize current licenses (and experience) from other states.

3. Stop licensing occupations the state isn’t monitoring. The fee structure for occupational licenses is out of sorts. Some fees are very low and others extremely high. Lawmakers have essentially set things up so that some occupations are heavily subsidizing others. That’s not appropriate. Licensing fees should cover the costs of inspections and oversight — if they don’t, the license is ripe for elimination.

4. Simplify or eliminate testing requirements and continuing education. Many of the test requirements to get a license and the continuing education to keep it are unnecessary. In fact, in many industries, it is an open joke. These mandates should be severely simplified or eliminated.

5. Simplify the applications and speed things up. Applying for a license and understanding what is actually required is difficult to understand. A regular person should easily be able to understand what is required. And licenses should be approved (or disapproved) quickly. State government is too slow — nobody should have to wait months or a year to be able to start working.

I’m glad the licensing agency is reaching out for thoughts. The department processes information on close to a million people per year. Even small changes in the right direction can have a large effect on a huge number of people.

Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy are properly cited.