Ben Shelton

Ben Shelton

Policy Associate

ben@libertas.org

Ben was a Policy Associate at Libertas Institute.

Ben Shelton's Articles

The Biden administration has officially taken one of the first significant steps toward federally decriminalizing marijuana.
This law school is being granted the ability to admit two incarcerated students each academic year.
Ryan Crownholm, who owns and operates MySitePlan.com, was issued a $1,000 citation and asked to suspend his business operations after a California professional licensing board claimed that Crownholm and his company illegally practiced land surveying without a state-mandated occupational license. 
Licensing restrictions are housed in individual states' statutory or administrative laws. At first, these seemingly innocent laws appear to simply define what a specific occupation is and what a practitioner of the occupation may do as well as establish conditions for entry into an occupation. However, there is a sinister side to occupational licensing.
The birthplace of a person bears little to no relationship on that individual’s ability to dutifully carry out the requirements of various professional roles. Yet for years, many states have utilized citizen status as a barrier to keep individuals from obtaining state-mandated occupational licenses. 
Libertas has long documented the detrimental effects of occupational licensing. This form of government regulation stifles economies and creates a stringent, artificial class system via economic protectionism. Unfortunately, in conversations relating to reforming occupational licensing laws, many overlook solutions outside of simply slashing various licensing requirements.