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>Since workers for most gig economy companies are considered independent contractors, not employees, they do not qualify for basic protections like overtime pay
by moonka 10y ago
>Since workers for most gig economy companies are considered independent contractors, not employees, they do not qualify for basic protections like overtime pay and minimum wages.
It concerns me how eager we are to be to roll back the hard won protections that our forefathers fought for. Time and again we see that the vast majority of businesses only look towards maximizing the short term, and exploit any loopholes that allow them to.
- brudgers 10y agoMy great grandmother worked in a Manhattan button factory at age 8. It made her mean. It's more than just overtime and minimum wage.
- cm2012 10y agoSorry to hear that, meanness and hate reverberates through generations.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dkarl 10y agoAnd we often allow ourselves to be distracted by hypothetical future policies when discussing whether to allow current protections to be undermined.
- mljoe 10y agoI can't imagine that 1099 contractors were ever envisioned to be used in the manner they are being employed by these companies. These employees (err.. I mean contractors) are long term, often full time and core to the business of the gig companies. I think that is incentive enough to make sure they aren't using 1099 payments as a loophole to abuse people or to pay less then min wage. Companies get punished for this all the time, and even if you are a big company with good lawyers you don't want the IRS as a plaintiff, ever. I think we'll see law that puts some bright policy lines on the gig economy, but as is the case politics is a lot slower to catch up.
- intended 10y agoFunnily enough, HN is, every so often, the bastion of this line of thought. Post 2008, the pendulum has been swinging the other way, but regulations were often argued as negative value. Of course people weren't assanine about it, and argued as best as they could on both sides.