Posts tagged gig work
Déjà vu all over again as Trump administration move to protect freelancing
March 2, 2026 // Congress should take up legislation to codify a sensible standard that protects gig economy workers and settles the issue for good. Legislation to that effect, the Employee Rights Act, has been introduced and deserves congressional consideration.
San Francisco’s Lamplighters Music Theatre cancels spring production, citing rising costs and AB5
February 18, 2026 // At the same time it’s lost revenue, costs have gone up due to AB5, among other factors. That law’s original target was gig-work companies such as Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Instacart, but those behemoths have so far escaped the law’s costly stipulations because of voter-passed Proposition 22. Meanwhile, tiny performing arts companies that lacked the resources to obtain a carve-out are the ones digging in their pockets for a law that wasn’t even written with them in mind. At Lamplighters, Uzelac said, paying the same artists now costs twice what it did before.
PODCAST: Empowering Workers with a Prosperous Future with Austen Bannan | Let People Prosper
January 15, 2026 // America’s labor policies are stuck in the past—designed for a 1930s economy that no longer exists. Meanwhile, workers have moved on. They want flexibility. They want choice. They want opportunity. And increasingly, government is standing in the way. My guest is Austen Bannan, Workforce Policy Fellow at Americans for Prosperity and one of the sharpest voices making the case for worker freedom over bureaucratic control. Austen works at the intersection of labor policy, occupational licensing, and education reform—where outdated rules quietly crush opportunity for millions of Americans.
California Clears Path for Gig Unions
November 23, 2025 // It's also clear that the political left will not be content to merely stop at unionization. Progressives like former California assemblymember (and sponsor of A.B. 5) Lorena Gonzalez (D–San Diego) have described unionization as "a step forward" but not "the limit of what's possible." Teamster President Sean O'Brien—whose GOP-convention speech highlighted Republicans' shift toward unions—has dismissed a similar Massachusetts unionization effort for gig workers, saying it supports "greedy corporations that want to deny full employment rights to workers."
Op-Ed: Instead of subsidy fights, Georgia should allow ‘portable’ benefits
October 20, 2025 // Meanwhile, other states have taken the lead on the matter. Utah, Tennessee and Alabama have all formally recognized portable benefits as a form of independent contractor compensation. Georgia can be next by passing a safe harbor portable benefits model, which will cost the state and federal government zero taxpayer dollars. It simply clarifies that companies can contribute to portable benefits accounts if they want and doing so is not evidence of an employee/employer relationship.
Commentary: From job lock to job choice: Congress rethinks worker power
September 12, 2025 // On the Hill, Senate HELP Committee Chair Sen. Bill Cassidy’s (R-La.) new Unlocking Benefits for Independent Workers Act is gaining bipartisan attention, and similar efforts are moving forward in the House. Many Democrats and Republicans agree that it’s time to remove what are essentially old legal loopholes that deny access to affordable benefits to millions of self-employed Americans. But there’s something more to the idea: Portable benefits could help all workers to better leverage their own economic power.
Protect Worker Freedom to Best Help Black Women, All Workers
August 21, 2025 // The removal of DEI positions and programming under the second Trump Administration is also credited with having a disparate impact on Black women. This argument might sound reasonable to regular people, but data doesn’t prove it. Black women are overrepresented in federal jobs compared to private sector employment. They comprise 6.6% of the civilian workforce but 12.1% of the federal workforce, the largest differential among racial demographics.
Editorial: Unionizing Uber and Lyft drivers may speed up their robotic replacement
July 2, 2025 // Here’s the issue for drivers. Labor talks are playing out as Uber and its competitors are investing heavily in driverless vehicles, just like Tesla. Uber isn’t hiding that future. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi even told The Wall Street Journal this year he expects AVs to gradually overtake human drivers.
Freelance Busting: Heart’s Desire
June 10, 2025 // Indeed found that 48% of women who switched to contract work reported improved mental health, and of the women who changed to gig work, one-third (38%) reported improved mental health. GrowTal/Opinium reported that 72% of women freelancers say their overall mental wellbeing has improved since freelancing. Freshbooks Cloud Accounting determined that 59% of self-employed women say they have less stress, and 57% of self-employed women say they’re healthier.
5.9% of Washington Workers Are Union Members, 6th Most in the U.S.
June 9, 2025 // Union membership in the United States has declined to its lowest point in decades. In 1979, unions represented 24.1% of the American workforce. By 2024, that share had fallen to just 9.9%, according to figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and UnionStats. In absolute terms, this represents a drop of roughly 6.7 million members—from a peak of 20.9 million in 1979 to around 14.2 million in 2024.