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How do you set that floor if not with this (or similar) regulation? I'm 100% with you on increasing education, but that has a delayed effect of many years. And

How do you set that floor if not with this (or similar) regulation? I'm 100% with you on increasing education, but that has a delayed effect of many years. And even with the delay, there will likely always be some people who need to make rent or feed their kids who'll accept the equivalent of a $5/hr job because it's all they can get. I was once that person, filling out quizzes on amazon's mechanical turk for what was effectively about $4/hr. I appreciate having had the work, but it still feels like a loophole around having a minimum wage. I've been on the 1099 side of the fence for a handful of jobs. It's a difficult place. You're on your own for a large portion of taxes and likely need to make estimated quarterly payments, there are no benefits (health insurance, etc), and there's a tangible lack of stability compared to a standard W2 situation. The only solution I see is twofold, first providing adequate social services so that people can survive reeducation / changing careers and then legislation exactly like this which ensures that employers act in a manner that's compatible with long-term social stability.

foogazi 7y ago
> I appreciate having had the work, but it still feels like a loophole around having a minimum wage. Do you think there is a place for sub-minimum wage jobs?
- katmannthree 7y ago
  Not in this country[0], no. If you allow a company to set the floor for their market with sub-living wages, then all other companies need to either match the low wages to stay competitive or they'll eventually fail or be taken over. On a slightly broader scale, I don't see any mechanism by which markets self-regulate to police unethical behavior. All I see is the opposite, companies rebranding when their image gets tarnished and hiring PR firms to lie to people but they don't actually stop behaving unethically. Even in rare cases when they get fined, oftentimes the fines are less than the profit they made from the specific actions they were fined for. [0] Global issues, trade, outsourcing, etc are a far bigger discussion.
  - foogazi 7y ago
    > If you allow a company to set the floor for their market with sub-living wages, then all other companies need to either match the low wages to stay competitive or they'll eventually fail or be taken over. If that is the case why aren’t we all making minimum wage?
    - katmannthree 7y ago
      Because we're talking about the floor of employment, unskilled / seasonal / temp labor. Different dynamics apply when you have valuable skills that make you harder (read: more costly) to replace. The people on the floor, whether they're there because they're just starting out or because they've experienced hardships or just because they don't want to go further, those people, shouldn't have to be living on the streets or go bankrupt from medical expenses. That's the entire point behind a minimum wage.
manigandham 7y ago
Many freelancers are specifically choosing not to take a job, especially when it comes to professional driving which has always existed as a full-time job if you wanted to work that way. I don't see any reason to limit people's freedom if they choose to go independent and create their own conditions. The better option would be, as you say, provide the social safety net with healthcare and tax support that isn't tied to employment so they aren't greatly disadvantaged when it comes to benefits.
- katmannthree 7y ago
  This particular legislation is intended to address the case where a company hires people as contractors while treating them as employees. Specifically, companies are allowed to treat people as contractors only when the work performed " a) is under the worker’s control and not that of the business, b) is not part of the company’s core business, and c) is part of the worker’s independent profession." Many freelancers will be entirely unaffected by that. >I don't see any reason to limit people's freedom if they choose to go independent and create their own conditions. Because the people the law was written for don't have a choice. The companies they work for didn't offer them a choice between employee and contractor, if they wanted the job they had to accept being a contractor. A lot of low end work these days is contract work, finding a position as an actual employee can be difficult (depending on the field of course). Very few of the people I talk to who are contractors are classified as such by choice. At some point, shouldn't helping the people at the bottom be a good thing even if a few better off freelancers have to make some changes (i.e. seeking employment with the companies they work for rather than contract status)?
  - manigandham 7y ago
    > "if they wanted the job they had to accept being a contractor" Then it's not a job, it's a contractor/freelance position. The choice if you don't want to be a freelancer driver for Uber is to not take that position. There are still millions of professional full-time drivers for trucks/shuttles/buses/taxis/medical/etc and those jobs have existed for decades. Ride-sharing only added more choices to the market. If you want to help people at the bottom, taking away choice is the opposite of what you should do. Create more jobs instead.

foogazi 7y ago

> I appreciate having had the work, but it still feels like a loophole around having a minimum wage. Do you think there is a place for sub-minimum wage jobs?

katmannthree 7y ago
Not in this country[0], no. If you allow a company to set the floor for their market with sub-living wages, then all other companies need to either match the low wages to stay competitive or they'll eventually fail or be taken over. On a slightly broader scale, I don't see any mechanism by which markets self-regulate to police unethical behavior. All I see is the opposite, companies rebranding when their image gets tarnished and hiring PR firms to lie to people but they don't actually stop behaving unethically. Even in rare cases when they get fined, oftentimes the fines are less than the profit they made from the specific actions they were fined for. [0] Global issues, trade, outsourcing, etc are a far bigger discussion.
- foogazi 7y ago
  > If you allow a company to set the floor for their market with sub-living wages, then all other companies need to either match the low wages to stay competitive or they'll eventually fail or be taken over. If that is the case why aren’t we all making minimum wage?
  - katmannthree 7y ago
    Because we're talking about the floor of employment, unskilled / seasonal / temp labor. Different dynamics apply when you have valuable skills that make you harder (read: more costly) to replace. The people on the floor, whether they're there because they're just starting out or because they've experienced hardships or just because they don't want to go further, those people, shouldn't have to be living on the streets or go bankrupt from medical expenses. That's the entire point behind a minimum wage.

manigandham 7y ago

Many freelancers are specifically choosing not to take a job, especially when it comes to professional driving which has always existed as a full-time job if you wanted to work that way. I don't see any reason to limit people's freedom if they choose to go independent and create their own conditions. The better option would be, as you say, provide the social safety net with healthcare and tax support that isn't tied to employment so they aren't greatly disadvantaged when it comes to benefits.

katmannthree 7y ago
This particular legislation is intended to address the case where a company hires people as contractors while treating them as employees. Specifically, companies are allowed to treat people as contractors only when the work performed " a) is under the worker’s control and not that of the business, b) is not part of the company’s core business, and c) is part of the worker’s independent profession." Many freelancers will be entirely unaffected by that. >I don't see any reason to limit people's freedom if they choose to go independent and create their own conditions. Because the people the law was written for don't have a choice. The companies they work for didn't offer them a choice between employee and contractor, if they wanted the job they had to accept being a contractor. A lot of low end work these days is contract work, finding a position as an actual employee can be difficult (depending on the field of course). Very few of the people I talk to who are contractors are classified as such by choice. At some point, shouldn't helping the people at the bottom be a good thing even if a few better off freelancers have to make some changes (i.e. seeking employment with the companies they work for rather than contract status)?
- manigandham 7y ago
  > "if they wanted the job they had to accept being a contractor" Then it's not a job, it's a contractor/freelance position. The choice if you don't want to be a freelancer driver for Uber is to not take that position. There are still millions of professional full-time drivers for trucks/shuttles/buses/taxis/medical/etc and those jobs have existed for decades. Ride-sharing only added more choices to the market. If you want to help people at the bottom, taking away choice is the opposite of what you should do. Create more jobs instead.