‘Independent Contractor’—Another Word for Employer-Free Ride

http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/05/27/independent-contractoranother-word-for-employer-free-ride/

by Mike Hall, May 27, 2008

New legislation would toughen penalties and crack down on employers who take away workers’ benefits and rights by misclassifying them as “independent contractors” instead of regular employees.


When workers are misclassified as independent contractors, they pay higher taxes and lose important rights, such as workers’ compensation coverage, minimum wage and overtime protections, family and medical leave and the right to organize and collectively bargain.


The problem is especially serious in the construction industry and is growing in the high-tech, communications, trucking and delivery services, janitorial services, agriculture, home health care, child care and other industries.


The bill (H.R. 6111) was introduced last week by Reps. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) and Robert Andrews (D-N.J.). Says Woolsey, chair of the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections:

Employers who misclassify their employees as independent contractors rob workers of needed pay and benefits and cost government at all levels substantial uncollected revenues. Despite, this enormous problem, the Department of Labor has failed not only to crack down on this practice by enforcing current laws, but has failed to coordinate with other agencies to address the issue.

There are more than 10 million workers classified as independent contractors and studies show a large percentage for those workers—as many as 3.4 million—are misclassified and should be regular employees. A Massachusetts study found 11.4 percent of the state’s construction workers had been misclassified as independent contractors between 2001 and 2003. And an Illinois study found that misclassification had increased by 55 percent between 2001 and 2005.


FULL story at link.

freelance Graphic Designer.
The full-time job market in my field is tough...
this keeps me from waitressing, but hope to be an employee soon.

I pay for insurance for myself and my two sons, no paid vacation, no paid sick days. no holiday pay.