Posts tagged self-employed
Freelancers Aim to Overcome Legal Setback Against Biden-Harris IC Rule
October 28, 2024 // Four additional federal lawsuits against the DOL’s rule are pending, including cases in Texas, New Mexico, Louisiana, and Tennessee. In several of these cases, the plaintiffs are companies suing from the position of hiring entities, which legal experts believe might better position them to overcome the standing hurdle.
Feeding the Kitty
September 30, 2024 // Unions have pursued shareholder resolutions asking for a “free and fair election process,” meaning card check and neutrality. They have also sought to pass resolutions demanding audits of a company’s labor practices. It’s not hard to see how a future resolution could explicitly try to prohibit companies from using independent contractors.
Harris Pushes Gig Workers, Contractors into Corporate Jobs with New Rule
September 25, 2024 // America already has too few people working. If the employment rate were the same as it was before the COVID-19 pandemic, 2.9 million more people would be working today. The last thing Americans need is another regulation that makes it harder to make a living and to afford the rising cost of living. Although the Biden-Harris regulation has only been in effect since March, and it’s too early to fully study its effects, the employment-to-population ratio dropped by 0.3 percentage points between March and July. This decline represents a loss of 700,000 workers.
Commentary: It’s the Side Hustle, Stupid
August 5, 2024 // These side hustlers are in addition to the millions of Americans who already earn all of our income as independent contractors. Many of us believe that this way of making a buck, with multiple streams of income, empowers us to avoid the kind of all-or-nothing layoffs that come with traditional jobs. Make no mistake: Having the ability to pick up a side hustle or go freelance is like a safety net in the back of many Americans’ minds. If, for whatever reason, we want or need to earn extra cash, we know this option exists.
Commentary: The Big Fear? A Real Rematch
July 6, 2024 // Just a few hours after the court’s ruling dropped late last week, allowing both ballot measures to proceed, the Massachusetts attorney general made an announcement of her own. She agreed to a deal that will let Uber and Lyft drivers in Massachusetts remain independent contractors, with a minimum hourly wage of $32.50 and some benefits. Interestingly, the attorney general’s announcement noted that the deal averts giving the people of Massachusetts a chance to vote on the matter:
Teaching doctors to unionize
June 27, 2024 // Once mostly self-employed or part of physician-owned groups, doctors are increasingly employees of hospitals or private equity firms. And, as employees, they have a right to organize, prompting unions of all stripes to make the case. Doctors who’ve joined say they’re persuaded by a desire to reclaim control over their lives, and to bargain for better pay and work conditions that they believe private equity and hospital ownership threaten.
Commentary: Tough Lessons of the CRA: Part III
June 17, 2024 // They need to hear it from all of us who wish to remain independent contractors. That means truckers. Translators. Graphic artists. Financial advisers. Nurses. Tutors. Sheep shearers. Writers. They need to hear it from every kind of independent contractor that exists in more than 600 professions identified as being affected so far.
A New Law Could Affect Your Retirement Side Hustle Income
April 10, 2024 // Kavin owns her own freelance writing and editing business in New Jersey and leads Fight For Freelancers USA, a nonpartisan coalition of freelancers from across the country that spans professions from translation to interior design. Around 20% of group members are ages 55 to 64 and nearly 10% are age 65 and older. Some members turned to freelancing after suffering age discrimination that cost them a traditional job, says Kavin. "They still want to work and earn, and the way they're able to do it is as independent contractors," she says. Kavin says she does well as a freelancer and does not want a traditional job, even if she could find one at her age. "It's a lot harder to find a traditional job in your 50s than in your 30s, especially one with the significantly higher level of income that I've been able to achieve as a freelancer," she says. "If I lose this self-employed business that I just spent 20 years building up, there may be no other place for me to go."
RESEARCH: Minimum Wage Laws and App-Based Workers
March 30, 2024 // Rideshare apps are not too different. They generate revenue by taking a share of the total cost paid by riders to drivers. What is less clear is how large that fee is and how that fee has changed over time and across platforms. Rather than seeking out a rigid wage floor, a fee floor could stand in for the sense of fairness across platforms of different types. If workers on platforms are truly entrepreneurs, picking and choosing when, where, and how to allocate their labor across multiple platforms, doing more to ensure that markets offer a fair share of revenue can get the job done far more efficiently than attempting to mandate any particular amount.
Commentary: Biden’s Independent Contractor Rule Threatens the Evolution of Work
March 15, 2024 // So what's the advantage of reclassifying independent workers as employees? The same as the disadvantage: It makes it harder for workers to be their own boss, to choose their own schedules, to represent themselves, to set their priorities as they see fit. If you believe in the evolution of the workplace and worker self-determination, this is bad. But if you believe in a one-size-fits-all work model where individuals are employed by traditional businesses and represented by traditional unions, this is great.