Michigan may not feel the economic drag of California’s 420,434 regulations, but the state under a Democratic trifecta of governor, Senate and House still feels the weight of nearly 78,000 legal restrictions.

A new study released this week by the Mercatus Center ranked Michigan’s number of regulations 38th behind number-one California.

According to Mercatus, Michigan residents are subject to 77,944 restrictions and 4,296,218 words as of 2023. The policy areas with the most state regulations are: Environmental Protection, Public Utilities, and Natural Resources; Labor and Workforce Development; Industry, Commerce and Development; Security, Justice and Corrections; Health Services; and Taxes and Public Finance.

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Mercatus lists among the top industries regulated in Michigan as Utilities; Chemical Manufacturing; Petroleum and Coal Products Manufacturing; and Waste Management and Remediation Services.

“Michigan’s regulatory regime is large, complex and powerful,” according to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy‘s Michael Van Beek and Jarret Skorup. “State statute even empowers regulators to define criminal activity — making ordinary citizens criminally liable to the whims of unelected bureaucrats. Michigan needs to rein in the power of the administrative state, and the best place to start is a thorough review of the state’s administrative code, to modify or remove regulatory rules that place too much power in the hands of bureaucrats.”

For example, Van Beek and Skorup say that Michigan’s rules governing occupational licensure are cumbersome.

“Occupational licensure is a requirement to get government permission to work legally,” the wrote. “It typically requires fees, hours of education and training, degrees and testing. Michigan mandates a license to work for about 180 occupations, or 20% of the total workforce. The state has made good, bipartisan strides on this issue in the last decade, especially when it comes to allowing those with criminal backgrounds or military service to get a license. But there’s more to do. Michigan should join the five other states that regularly review all licensing rules to ensure they still make sense. Lawmakers should also join other states that fully reciprocate licensing; that is, if someone is licensed in one state, they can easily transfer that license to Michigan.”

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Skorup noted in an oped printed in the Morning Sun this week that Michigan doesn’t recognize or reciprocate occupational licenses from other states. Relaxing those regulations, he said, might actually encourage out-of-state workers to move to Michigan.

“We are talking about dozens of professions, not just therapists and counselors. All told, about one in five Michigan jobs require a license. These jobs range from preschool teachers to veterinary technicians, HVAC contractors to massage therapists, school bus drivers to commercial fishermen. If you already have a license and move to Michigan, you have to hope the state easily reciprocates or … you’ll be out of work while having to re-take classes or navigate the bureaucracy.”

Skorup added: “That isn’t exactly cheap. Michigan licenses often cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. Many require months or years of education and experience—even a license to wash hair requires hundreds of hours of training—which can mean years of not earning an income. It’s an obvious barrier to moving to Michigan.”

He recommends that Michigan join the other 20 states that have passed licensing reciprocity bills.

“Other states are giving Michiganders a reason to leave, but Michigan isn’t giving Americans a reason to come,” he said. “Arizona goes the furthest of any state, recognizing any license or a person’s work experience, automatically making new arrivals eligible to begin working immediately. This isn’t that controversial. Michigan does the same thing, but right now that is limited to military members, veterans, or their family members. We should do it for everyone.”

Last December, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s Growing Michigan Together Council recommended that Michigan’s leaders adopt licensing reciprocity.

“Yet over halfway into 2024, the legislature has yet to act, even though similar bills have been introduced in years past,” Skorup said. “In other states, this is a bipartisan issue, and Michigan lawmakers on both sides of the aisle should champion this reform.”

Michigan’s neighboring Midwestern states ranked worse in the Mercatus study. Illinois was ranked fourth with 282,000 regulations; Ohio was ranked sixth with 246,000 regulations; Wisconsin was ranked 13th with 165,000 rankings; Minnesota was ranked 31st with 99,000 regulations; and Indiana was ranked 35th with 92,000 regulations.

“Federal regulations are associated with large human and economic impacts both nationally and in the state of Michigan,” the authors of the Mercatus study note. “However, state regulations are another significant source of government rules and red tape, with their own human and economic consequences. The weight of these layers of regulation worsens economic conditions, inadvertently increasing poverty rates, destroying jobs, and raising prices. The path to reversing these trends broadly is simple: improve regulations by reducing their number.”

Mercatus recommends that states enforce a limit on the number of regulations and further recommends that they establish a target that is lower than the number of regulations currently in effect.

“This can be done by setting a goal for a percentage to be cut, establishing a ‘one in, X out’ rule, or monetizing the costs of regulations so that new regulatory costs are offset by eliminating existing regulatory costs,” the authors wrote.

They also recommend establishing a sunset requirement for all regulations, unless the legislature votes to renew them.

“This standard builds in an implicit periodic review of rules,” the authors note. “If the regulation is providing the intended benefit, it doesn’t need to be cut. If the regulation is ineffective or burdensome, it can be eliminated. If policymakers allow a regulation to expire without reviewing it, why should their constituents continue to be held accountable for it?”