Insightful post. Occupational licensing is regressive because it hurts lower income families the most. Single mother wants to run a salon from her apartment in the projects? Illegal. Guy wants to hustle cigarettes on the street? Death sentence.<p>Makes things more expensive for consumers, and totally chokes out small startups.<p>Licensing should be voluntary, and paid for by premium prices. Instead we have all these artificial monopolies crushing competition and distorting prices.