Luke Hanks, president of Salon Schools Group, asked Ohio legislators this week to preserve the state’s ridiculous hair salon “manager’s license” requiring 300 hours of training — a requirement from which his schools profit.

Something Hanks didn’t tell legislators: 66 percent of students at his Canal Winchester cosmetology school aren’t repaying the federal student loans taken out to help pay his school’s staggering $19,400 tuition. In other words, nearly two-thirds of students haven’t repaid a single dollar of the money borrowed from the federal government to attend the for-profit Ohio State School of Cosmetology in Canal Winchester, reports ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative journalism organization.

Ohio requires way too much training — 1,500 hours — to become a licensed cosmetologist. Our vocational schools do the job as well, if not better, in 1,125 hours for high school students, and at a fraction of the cost.

The hair salon “manager’s license” isn’t about public safety or cosmetology competence. It’s a way to add 300 hours of training so private cosmetology schools hit the financially magical number of 1,800 “clock hours” — the exact number needed to squeeze every last penny from federal student aid programs.

These 300 hours generate an extra $1,925 in federal money per student. One hour less would leave money on the table; one hour more wouldn’t harvest additional cash.

Ohio’s career technical schools rarely teach this useless license. Instead, our tech teachers properly tell students to get some real-world salon experience and take the manager’s test for $50 when they’re ready.

Of students taking the manager’s license test, 97 percent were sold training by for-profit cosmetology schools. “Manager’s license” training generates more than $5 million a year for private schools.

The state’s role as a student sales funnel to private cosmetology schools in the business of harvesting federal student aid is an unseemly use of state licensing power.

The average Ohio cosmetologist makes $12.16 an hour, reports the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Ninety-five percent are women. Many are single moms.

Stripped to its essence, the story is simple: The state is encouraging young, low-income, working women to pay tithes to wealthy salon school owners. The state-issued license returns to hair stylists what was unfairly taken from them — the right to get a promotion and a $3-an-hour raise, based on merit, at a hair salon.

Is it really surprising that a mother earning $12 an hour can’t repay $10,000 in cosmetology school loans? To ask the better question: What can be done to help Ohioans work and succeed in this creative occupation?

The legislature needs to end the manager’s license immediately and reduce the hours of training required to become a licensed cosmetologist to 1,125 hours — the same as for high school kids in our career technical schools. New York requires just 1,000 hours, cutting the cost of obtaining a cosmetology license in half and causing no decline in safety or quality.

At a certain point, cosmetologists benefit most from experience in the real world, not school. Let Great Clips and other salons train their own workers.

Let salon owners promote based on merit. If salons need better managers, let them pay more.

As for Luke Hanks, one might think a “manager’s license” would be necessary to run his cosmetology schools. But one would be wrong, because he’s not even a licensed cosmetologist. As he says, he’s a “finance guy.”

On that much, we agree.