California’s ‘Pro-Worker’ Law Is Killing Jobs Left and Right

[rangerrebew]

California’s ‘Pro-Worker’ Law Is Killing Jobs Left and Right

Rachel Greszler / January 07, 2020 

California's AB% is killing freelance jobs
 

If you want less of something, raise its price. That’s the logic behind policies such as cigarette and soda taxes and plastic bag fees.

Somehow, policymakers in California thought that by raising the cost of doing business with independent workers, they could make all those workers better off.

But now, instead of higher benefits and improved job protections, many independent workers are losing their jobs, along with the flexibility and autonomy they value.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2020/01/07/californias-pro-worker-law-is-killing-jobs-left-and-right/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=californias-pro-worker-law-is-killing-jobs-left-and-right&

[EdinVA]

Pro Workers?  Not hardly... it is social engineering by force....
Enough with the "spin"

[PeteS in CA]

The targets of this law were ride-sharing companies like Uber and Lyft, which have hurt large cities' taxi medallion oligopoly revenue. But because the law could not, constitutionally, be specific in the targeting, it was written more broadly as a smokescreen-sham. And by so doing all kinds of freelance and contract work got ensnared. I would not be surprised if beauticians and personal trainers are affected by this idiocy.

[PeteS in CA]

https://calmatters.org/commentary/gig-economy-3/

California’s new gig worker law is disrupting the music industry and threatening all performing arts

However, the law has created a tangle of red-tape and administrative expense for large portions of California’s cultural sector.

To illustrate: In 2019, San Jose Jazz presented more than 1,000 musicians across 326 different performances. The vast majority were independent musicians and singers from California, the nation, and around the world.
...
For some big name acts, we contract with their corporate agent and pay the agency for the band’s performance. However, for most musicians, we work directly with the band leader to agree on a price and terms, providing them payment as independent contractors. They, in turn, pay their band members in accordance with IRS Schedule C filing rules.

Under AB 5, we will be required to inform all U.S.-based musicians that they must now become employees of San Jose Jazz, or incorporate themselves before they will be allowed to perform for us.

If band leaders choose to pursue incorporation, they will then need to take on the responsibility of payroll and HR administration for the rest of their band.

In many performing arts disciplines, such as jazz, musicians are constantly reconfiguring line ups, performing as sidemen in various bands, and as one-time special guests for specific performances.

We will now be obliged to devote tremendous time and resources to constantly hiring, managing and tracking of musicians through this cumbersome process.

AB 5 unnecessarily complicates other work arrangements found in community cultural programming such as small festivals, neighborhood street fairs, parades and summer music series in our local parks.
...
Brendan Rawson is the executive director of San Jose Jazz, brendanr@sanjosejazz.org. He wrote this commentary for CalMatters.

This law sounds much more disruptive than even I had thought. It's a classic case of what happens when politicians try to squeeze reality into their little bureaucratic control-freak box.

What used to be called the San Jose Jazz Festival has been around for quite a while, 20 years of which I am aware. @Jazzhead

[rangerrebew]

California's Anti-Self-Employment Law Is Already Crushing Freelancers
 
01/18/2020Andrew Moran

In 1971, Isaac Asimov wrote an extraordinary novel, The Gods Themselves, about a machine that generates unlimited energy for free, defying the fundamental economic principle known as scarcity. It is later learned that the Electron Pump is originating from a hole in space that connects parallel universes. Doomsday is nigh as it is discovered that galaxies will soon be destroyed and that the sun will metastasize into a supernova. The crux of the story is comparable to what is transpiring in California.

State lawmakers possess an infinite source of good intentions, using the eternal supply to pave roads to hell. Wielding the power of this limitless benevolence and munificence, politicians are regulating the lives of citizens while eviscerating their existence in the process. If this is goodwill, then we can only imagine what the state is capable of when it desires to ruin you or your business.

https://mises.org/wire/californias-anti-self-employment-law-already-crushing-freelancers