Ask Slashdot: Opinions on the State Breaking Its Own Law Against Employee Misclassification? 165
An anonymous reader writes: I've had the privilege of developing software as an independent contractor for various agencies of a particular state for many years. These past few, however, have seen changes: now I, and almost every other contractor I know, are being managed very differently. This state is now making a widespread practice of using the businesses it awards contracts to as staffing agencies, knowing full well that the people coming in are 1099s and receive none of the benefits or protections of regular employees. These contractors are expected to be on site full-time, are not allowed to use their own hardware or software, and are managed alongside, and perform substantially the same work as other, regular employees. This is apparently done to cut costs.
The State has no legal risk here — that rests solely on the businesses it awards contracts to. But given that this particular state takes a hard line against misclassifying employees, this strikes me as profoundly hypocritical. I am not here to ask for legal advice. Indeed, I have already retained counsel in this matter. Considering additional detail that I won't get into here, Federal law is likely being broken. Since this is also one of the states that have the strict 'three prong' test for classifying employees, the State's own law is definitely being broken.
I thought, maybe somebody should say something. But my lawyer's reaction surprised me. He said — this isn't a big deal, you could just go find another client. And you know what? He's right. I could totally do that. Maybe since we in the IT industry tend to be well paid, nobody should care, and there's no reason complain. I'm not asking for legal advice or a recommendation as to what I should do personally; I'm still forming an opinion on the larger issue here, and I'd like you to share yours.
The State has no legal risk here — that rests solely on the businesses it awards contracts to. But given that this particular state takes a hard line against misclassifying employees, this strikes me as profoundly hypocritical. I am not here to ask for legal advice. Indeed, I have already retained counsel in this matter. Considering additional detail that I won't get into here, Federal law is likely being broken. Since this is also one of the states that have the strict 'three prong' test for classifying employees, the State's own law is definitely being broken.
I thought, maybe somebody should say something. But my lawyer's reaction surprised me. He said — this isn't a big deal, you could just go find another client. And you know what? He's right. I could totally do that. Maybe since we in the IT industry tend to be well paid, nobody should care, and there's no reason complain. I'm not asking for legal advice or a recommendation as to what I should do personally; I'm still forming an opinion on the larger issue here, and I'd like you to share yours.
So... (Score:5, Insightful)
...what's the question?
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
...what's the question?
He doesn't have one. He's ten steps ahead of you and doesn't want your advice. He precludes you contributing positively in any way you could conceive of.
So ... yeah. Not sure WTF.
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This is how federal contracts have worked for years.
Often, employees can get the WORST of both worlds...if they are hired as a W2 employee of the contracting house (usually the prime) of a federal gig. Yes you get some benefits, but you don't get the pay and freedom of a full blown contractor.
If you can get your foot in the door and work things, it is best to try to incorporate yourself and maybe be a sub to a prime or sub to a sub(bottom line you are paid 1099)...in whic
Re:So... (Score:4, Insightful)
OTOH, the employer has to pay payroll taxes of the employee, there's paid time off, etc. And well, the person doesn't have to seek out work when the contract's running out (because of the way things work, an independent contractor has the obligation to seek additional work to provide "independence" - you cannot have your contract renewed over and over again otherwise you can get classified as an employee.
All that is why contractors are paid more money - because instead of benefits and perks, all that is cashed out. You take time off - you don't get paid, so you're paid more to compensate for that. The contracting company doesn't pay payroll taxes on you - that's now your responsibility, etc.
Of course, the downside is you're cashing out your perks. If you're taxed at 25%, that means your paid time off is now taxed. So instead of taking 8 hours off, you got cashed out 8 hours, and effectively were paid for 6 hours.
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Not true.
Especially not true if you're working federal contracts....been on multi-year, renewed ones m
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And for non-Americans, WTF is a "1099"?
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It means you are treated as a contractor who is paid directly without (normally) the removal of payroll taxes. It means that the individual is responsible for his or her own health insurance and other benefits as well as income tax payments.
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1099 is the number of the form used by companies (or individuals, in some cases) to report to the IRS payments made to non-employees. Recipients of said 1099s are responsible for paying all the income tax, social security tax, etc, on said payments. (There are subcategories of 1099 for reporting other kinds of payments, such as royalties, interest, etc.)
In contractor speak it means you're getting paid as an independant, rather than a regular employee (employee earnings are reported on a form W-2, and it
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It's one of several forms that companies use to tell the IRS they paid you money.
Employees get something called a W2, which has a detailed breakdown of their total earnings, how much of those earnings were taxable for normal income tax, Social Security Tax, medicare tax, and state and local income taxes. It also includes lots of tax-relevent info like contributions to your retirement account, and some non-relevent info that the Feds have decided you should have (the bit of your health premium paid by your e
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Obviously the question is "Fuck yea, government sucks!"
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Obviously the question is "Fuck yea, government sucks!"
as opposed to what exactly?
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But I don't know any Russian!
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I'm being taken advantage of (Score:4, Insightful)
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It's telling that this post is universally met by cynical acceptance. The system is so broken, and has been broken for so long, that nobody even pretends to care about making it better.
And we ask why there is so much despair regarding the state of our government.
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What are my options to stop it? That's all he's asking
Stop what? The higher pay that 1099s routinely get in lieu of job security and benefits?
That stopped 20 years ago (Score:2)
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OP is not asking "What are my options to stop it?" - that should be directed to the lawyer he has already retained. Asking that here will get the response "Ask a lawyer".
OP is asking what we think. I think I'm going to have a really nice shit in a few hours after what I just ate. I also think I don't understand
Is this a big deal (Score:5, Insightful)
...what's the question?
The big question is whether state misreporting of employees and IC's is a big deal. Anonymous poster sees gross hypocrisy by his government and is told by legal counsel that it's not a big deal, wants others to weigh in so that he can better conceptualize how he should feel about this--he's looking to third parties for feedback on something that strikes him as morally suspect and affects his life. That's actually an incredibly healthy, rational, and unusual attitude.
Is it a big deal? Yes and no. It's common to have people misrepresent employees as ICs in order to avoid the legal responsibilities of employment--that's *why* the IRS and various states crack down on it. So it's certainly not an *unusual* deal. And if you're making bank, it may not affect you much personally.
But it may affect a lower-income worker who gets treated the same way by the state and is denied overtime benefits, or the woman who's discriminated against by the state's hiring process and finds it much harder to sue, or the corrections officer who doesn't get a pension, for example. So there's some reason to call the state out on it for the public good.
There's *also* a strong argument that they should be called out on it because *they should have to put up with* the employment rules everyone else follows. They're the ones who change the rules, so they should experience having to live with them.
So there are reasons to responsibly disclose, but not much personal benefit to you. You risk a whistleblower sign over your head for the rest of your career unless you do it intelligently. You could sort of go a middle-ground, where you don't go to the press, for example, but do include a note on your taxes that the state has deliberately misclassified you as an independent contractor as part of a systemic process that affects many thousands of employees. I have no idea if the IRS would do anything with it (I'm guessing not), but you would be reporting it. Ah, here we go, the IRS has a way to report fraud:
http://www.irs.gov/Individuals... [irs.gov]
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Re:Is this a big deal (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, this. The part I found the most disturbing was:
"Maybe since we in the IT industry tend to be well paid, nobody should care, and there's no reason complain."
There's a pretty significant portion of the tech industry that isn't necessarily well paid, nor do they have much in the way of job security. When times are good, they do just fine. When times aren't, they bounce between really marginal contracts and unemployment. (I replaced IT with tech because I've spent most of my time in software development, so most of my knowledge of IT as a field is somewhat second hand.)
Tech culture tends to be all about individual achievement - and on the flip side, if you're not bringing in the buck, then you must be an underachiever, right? Which just means that if you are one of the workers who is more vulnerable, and if you are being exploited, there's more social pressure not to speak up about it, because you don't want to be labelled a whiner, when everyone knows that it's really that you couldn't hack it.
(Just in case there's any doubt, while I'm a big fan of people doing cool stuff, and rather like to do cool stuff myself, I think the above is a rather stupid and short sighted approach to structuring a either a business or a society.)
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Me too. Grammar is important.
Also, we in the IT industry tend to be underpaid unless we actually land a job offer. Getting a retention raise or accepting is irrelevant, it's the fact that we can be misclassified in our job title and vastly underpaid.
Wait, "misclassified" sounds familiar. Should I care?
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I kinda figure the question answers itself at "the government is breaking the law."
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He wants your musings on the situation.
Which is pretty much what he'd get, even if he actually had a question to ask, so I strongly suspect he's the only person whose ever done an Ask Slashdot after reading Slashdot.
legal risk (Score:5, Interesting)
It is not true the state is free from legal risk. I was in a somewhat similar situation and I was arguing that the contracting company was a sham and I was actually an employee of the original company.
I received a big check to shut me up.
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The problem is the State's "legal risk" is covered by the taxpayer, not willing investors. It's hard to call it a risk at all.
Which State? (Score:1)
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Doubt it. Walker's not a guy who'd enforce the contractor/employee rules vigorously, and the OP specifically stated:
"But given that this particular state takes a hard line against misclassifying employees, this strikes me as profoundly hypocritical."
I was doing that in the 2000s for a state ... (Score:2)
... yeah, funny, huh? The state doesn't judge itself harshly for that.
Right vs wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
Unfortunately, I often find myself in the minority on points like this. But here's where I typically come out:
Everyone has a responsibility to report wrong-doing, when they see it. Even if this is not a legal responsibility, it is a moral one. Certainly, one can take this too far, and become a nitpicker. It's not one's responsibility to be a nitpicker. But it is one's responsibility to set a reasonable line in the sand, and when one sees that line crossed, then act accordingly.
I get the sense you wouldn't be asking the question if you thought this fell into the category of nitpicking. The fact you feel the need to ask the question in the first place probably provides the answer right there. I believe you have a moral responsibility to not just look the other way. And this might involve risk to you. But where would we be as a society if people were afraid to take such risks in order to fix wrongs?
Re:Right vs wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
Obviously, legal != moral, but it's important to consider the reasons behind these employment laws.
I've seen a lot of construction workers being taken advantage of by shady contractors who misclassify them. The workers are overworked, underpaid, and left without a lot of the protections that employees take for granted even in at-will, right to work red states. Competitors who follow the rules are regularly underbid by the cheaters. And how do you think a contractor who does this to his employees treats his clients? Keeping mum about these illegal practices is bad for us all.
Re:Right vs wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is that it isn't going to fix anything, and will just cause problems for him. This problem of treating employees as "contractors" isn't just with this state, it's everywhere. I've seen it with a bunch of small businesses with friends/relatives. Supposedly, the IRS takes a dim view of this practice, and allows employees to file SS-8 forms to report such employers, and force them to pay their proper share of FICA taxes and such. However, in practice, the IRS simply ignores these submissions and lets employers do whatever they want.
But where would we be as a society if people were afraid to take such risks in order to fix wrongs?
When society is so screwed-up that taking risks never actually improves things, and only results in trouble for the whistleblower, why bother? Face it, our current society hates whistleblowers. They're even called "rats". They're not well-perceived by anyone except a minority of people who are already malcontents.
This guy is a software developer; the market for that profession is actually really good currently (though much more so in certain areas than others). He just needs to go find a new job. He'll probably get paid a lot more too. State governments aren't exactly known for being high-paying employers.
The IRS isn't ignoring them (Score:2)
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What is the "wrong" exactly? Who is the victim? Work for a wage you see fit and the employer is willing to pay. If everyone is happy with their paychecks then there isn't really a morality crisis here. The rules (and costs) around employment are idiotic and this is simply a symptom of it. It's ridiculous how many rights employers and employees are losing. Lawyers won't touch this because the laws are dumb and there aren't any victims worth fighting for.
Society at whole suffers with this, it is tax evasion for one thing, and it is reduced wages and benefits for another. The taxes collected are lower, so there is less funding to government by using an unlawful classification. It doesn't really matter if it is a private office or a government office that is the one evading taxes, the fact is that federal taxes and probably state taxes are being evaded. By hiring them as 1099 workers to avoid providing benefits like medical insurance, FICA and other taxes,
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A story like what? "I worked for a while for this small business, was paid as a contractor instead of a regular employee, even though I was definitely treated as an employee, so I sent the IRS a SS-8 form and never heard back from them. Then I worked for another company in the same capacity, filed another SS-8 form, and nothing happened there either." How is that "a story to kill for"? Who knows, maybe the IRS called up the employer, he disagreed, and they closed the case. Even assuming the employer is
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This is why Groklaw shut down, actually.
Really? Do you have any more links about this, or can you expand on it?
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But where would we be as a society if people were afraid to take such risks in order to fix wrongs?
Where we are today?
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In spite of the setbacks felt by the lower economic classes in the U.S., where we are today is the richest country in the world with the highest standard of living, and (aside from our ghastly treatment of drug users/dealers, who are really the lions share of our incarceration problem), a country that places a high premium on freedom. It's not a perfect country. It no longer holds the the moral high ground it once held. But it's still quite a great place. And the way we'll keep it from slipping further
Lawyer (Score:2)
"I asked my legal expert for advice, but I didn't like it. Hey, you folks on the internet got any better opinions?"
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He specifically says he's not looking for advice. He's asking opinions on the moral and ethical lines associated with the practice itself. Some people are going to be fine with it, others outraged. He's formed a basic opinion of things, but he's still fine-tuning it and wants to hear potential alternate viewpoints to factor in.
Morally, I have no problem with it unless the 1099 staff is being dramatically underpaid (which often happens to inexperienced people and that leads to its own inefficiencies when
"...I'd like you to share yours." (Score:2)
Class Action? Similar story... (Score:5, Informative)
IANAL, but ...
Many years ago, I worked in the USA for a Canadian Corp. The Corp. routinely bounced payroll checks, delayed sending payroll checks, or wrote payroll checks for less than the amount owed. Every time theses things happened, the Corp. claimed it was difficulties with exchange rates and transfers to the USA bank from which pay checks were drawn for USA employees.
I happened to work right across the street from a US Federal Building, so one day, several co-workers and myself walked over to inquire about any remedies that might be possible. We provided documentation to the helpful FBI agent who said bouncing payroll checks could fall under FBI jurisdiction. I also happened to mention the situation to my congressman who I knew socially as a long time family friend. A few weeks later, a Treasury Department person called and told us that nothing could be done to induce better behavior by a Canadian Corp. with respect to USA "employees", and furthermore, we weren't employees. We were considered independent contractors from the point of view of the Canadian Corp. Apparently, a shell USA Corp. employed us as regular employees with benefits and then contracted with the parent Corp. for our time. We received W-2 instead of 1099, but we were effectively 1099 contractors. The Treasury representative seemed to be telling us that we were not protected by USA labor laws or banking laws.
Treasury representative's statements didn't seem right, and we asked many questions to clarify our understanding. Several of us asked a local lawyer about the situation, and the answer we got was that any court action would have to start in Canada, and any settlement would be consumed by attorney fees. In other words, it wasn't worth it.
After a while of continued mistreatment, all of the USA employees except a few salesmen who worked on commission moved on to greener pastures. Such is life.
Damages (Score:1)
One of the genius aspects of Anglo-American common law is that as a general principle breaking a law doesn't matter if there are no damages. The rise of the regulatory state is a big exception to this principle, unfortunately.
Yes, theoretically there may be a problem in the future. But if nobody is being hurt now, nobody should care. _When_ people are hurt by this, then those hurts can bring a lawsuit.
Waiting for damages to occur might be foolish, but it's much less foolish than allowing people or the state
It IS FRAUD (Score:3)
Pretty common situation (Score:2)
Private Prisons provide sub-standard food and medical care, that no state employee could possibly defend.
Charter schools sometimes provide religious instructions that the state could not get away with.
Private adoption agencies reject people based on illegal stan
Retain Better Counsel (Score:3)
I am not a lawyer, but it seems like this matter likely has the potential to be turned into a class action matter.
Not to troll for work on /., but if you need counsel with experience in successfully litigating large scale class action suits, get in touch with me. (replace the ve with rmstrong at gmail in my name) We work with some of the largest law firms in the world and routinely handle class action suits. I cannot list specific disputes due to client confidentiality, but they are some of the largest matters that have been settled in the last decade and have received plenty of media attention. There are plenty of firms who are not representing the large state that you speak of and they can easily pass a conflict check.
If your attorney is advising you to go find another job and more or less ignore this, he is not the right person to be representing you. You are aware of the extent of the issue and the potential ramifications. Find a firm that also understands that and you all can make significant amounts of money.
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If your attorney is advising you to go find another job and more or less ignore this, he is not the right person to be representing you. You are aware of the extent of the issue and the potential ramifications. Find a firm that also understands that and you all can make significant amounts of money.
It's actually not bad advice, IMHO. I think a lot of good legal advice is to avoid legal conflicts if you can do it without meaningful damages. In this case, the guy could just find another client and move on.
Su
people are angry at salaries/ perks of state emp. (Score:2)
this is your problem:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
of course, in a sane society, rather than tearing down state employees for their lavish benefits and income, people would be insisting their own salaries be raised to match, to reverse how their salaries and benefits have been gutted the last few decades so the CEO can buy more gold toilets and mistresses
look to scott walker's effort to gut unions: there's a lot more of that from his playbook coming across republican controlled state houses soon
unfortuna
Just wait until this is the good old days... (Score:2)
It could be worse, you could be vested in their pension program. The fact is that human beings are not well equipped to manage 7 billion human souls on earth today. The economics is too complex and dynamic for our mammalian lives and tribal clans to fully conceive. Even IF everyone was fair and agreed to a system, it would likely fail to function for very long before short stick ends were everywhere. Perhaps the idea that there are perhaps one billion jobs for seven billion people should be a clue. The
You're boned. (Score:2)
The state can do whatever it wants. If you think laws apply to the state and federal departments then you were either born yesterday or have no clue as to how the real work actually works.
Are you contracted with the state or a company? (Score:3)
If you're through a consulting company that sells your time to the state and managed like an employee then you're not an employee of the state. You're an employee of that consulting company. The arrangement between the state and your employer is one thing, and your arrangement with the consulting company is another. Your company can't sell your time on a regular schedule to the state and then tell you you're a contract employee. That doesn't mean the state can't contract for a company's employees to be assigned to work on-site at the state's offices, though.
If you're on contract with the state directly, then they should treat you like a contractor. If they manage you as an employee, they need to employ you internally. If they want to keep you as a contractor, they should give you those freedoms.
You need to know that this isn't just about you. Allowing yourself to be treated as an employee and compensated as a contractor weakens everyone else's position, too. In fact, there's probably a union like AFSCME that would be very interested to talk to you about this.
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You may notice I never suggested the OP join a union. I mentioned that the union would be interested in how he's being classified at an agency that undoubtably has some union employees.
it's the State, stupid (Score:2, Insightful)
the whole point of having a State is that there is one set of rules for State actors and another set of rules for everybody else. Qualified immunity, massive pollution, wasting resources, welching on promises, breaking every damn law on the books when it furthers wealth and power; how about you go work for a business that's not so wildly corrupt? - heck, even on Wall Street you'd do better.
We didn't always do that (Score:2)
One thing I know for sure, the "State" is really our only hope. I can't think of anything that can stand up to the might of a Mega-Corp. Maybe the won't; maybe they'll always just be in cahoots. But I'm watching local gov'ts get picked apart one by one. They just don't have the power. If you want to get something done in America you use the federal gov't. That's how we got rid of Apa
It's been that way for 30+ years (Score:2)
Every single contract I worked on save for one required that you use the company's equipment on site due to security requirements of the job. Every single one.
This isn't some weird "breach of regulations" -- it's the norm.
WTF are you bothering with a lawyer for? Aren't you paid enough to just do your damned job and STFU? You think you're going to "cash out" with some big lawsuit?
Even if you do cash out, expect to be blacklisted by every agency across the country when they find out what you've done
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So you're going to ban outsourcing, then?
Where is the harm? (Score:2)
Still, I'm with you on this - I really hate when politicians and agencies or anyone for that matter imposes rules on others, then exempts or ignores the rules themselves.
S O V E R E I G N I M M U N I T Y (Score:2)
... look it up. The idea is that lawmakers are not bound by the very laws they write because they could have written themselves immunity. IOW, the boss rules.
This is deeply unAmerican and rooted in fealty to power rather than all power flowing from the people and laws (& Constitutions) first and foremost binding governments. That states (and the Feds too!) [ab]use this convenient feature merely shows them to by tyrants, perhaps fearsome but unworthy of respect.
Re:S O V E R E I G N I M M U N I T Y (Score:2)
I don't see the problem (Score:2)
Either you're an employee and get loaded up with benefits of being an employee, or you're a contractor and you get loaded up with benefits of being an employee for the contracting company. That is not a misclassification.
Now if you're a one man contractor then I would question your own policies. Not sure what the laws are like where you are but in some countries even if you act as your own sole contractor you are effectively your own employee and have an obligation to pay your own retirement fund, pay your
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or you're a contractor and you get loaded up with benefits of being an employee for the contracting company
If you're a contractor you get more cash, but you need to spend some of it on yourself for things like health insurance and vacation. All the employer has done is shift the administration of those benefits from their HR department to you. In the end it should be a wash, but some people like to complain.
widespread (Score:2)
The federal government and universities do the same. For all the talk about fair employment, I don't know that many leaders of large bureaucratic organizations have the ability to enforce fair employment practices on their people.
The bottom line is that offices that do this are not going to be good places to work, whether you're a contractor or an employee. I've worked in government for really great managers who were required by law to do stupid things to their employees. Government managers are often bal
What state (Score:2)
But I'll lay dollars to donuts you're talking about a state in the south.
Did you agree to be a contractor or an employee? (Score:2)
I don't understand why the government gets to decide if somebody is an employee or a contractor. If two parties agree to an employee or contractor relationship, then their agreement should determine the status of their relationship. A lot of these lawsuits involve people who knowing signed up as a contra
Why the changes (Score:2)
Gov using contractors to watch over skilled contractors as they help gov upgrade to expensive new security.
The covert side of the gov and mil wanted the skills but no questions, no paper trail, no project names, multiple social security numbers, social media magic and an instant job interface between the public and private sector. That was harder to create but offers stories
Talk to the union (Score:2)
Who is harmed? (Score:2)
You say the goal is "to cut costs", but what costs?
If the cost-savings comes from undermining a union, they probably would have sued already, so I'm guessing it's not that.
This shouldn't be a tax dodge, because 1099s should end up paying roughly the same federal and state tax, so it must be a reduction in actual compensation. Assuming that's the case, those being harmed look to be the 1099 employees themselves. As such, it would seem like a class action suit would be the appropriate course of action. If t
Latin proverb ... (Score:2)
Quod licet Iovis, non licet bovis ...
What is legal for Jupiter, is not legal for an ox ...
Re:Sit down, shut up, and do your work... until... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes..and SHHHHHHH!!!
Don't start complaining about this. Those of us in the 1099 contracting game LIKE it this way!!
There's nothing magical or that difficult about paying your own benefits!! Medical is easy, just get a high deductible policy (and many of them since obama care came out are this way) of about $1200 deductible, you can also set up a HSA (Health Savings Account) and sock away about $3K annually pre-tax....for your routine meds and co-pays, etc.
You set up a solo-401K or IRA..whatever you like...and you know how to negotiate your bill rate to cover medical/retirement/timeoff and you're good to go. This way, you generally have MUCH more freedom with work (no more fucking waiting to *EARN* vacation hours...take them off when you want), and you can write off many things, driving to/from job site is a good one, equipment, and as I've mentioned before, if you set yourself up as a S-corp of one person, and pay yourself a reasonable salary W2 from your own company, you only have to pay employment taxes (SS and medicare) on that portion of your money, the rest falls through to personal income taxes at EOY..where only state and federal are taxes..and thats AFTER you take your deductions out.
All you have to do, is be able to wear your big boy pants and keep up with a bit of paperwork yourself, be responsible with money (save enough to pay EOY taxes, make sure to pay quarterly taxes)...and also good idea to hire a CPA (deductible).
You get more freedom to work like you wish, and you have a fighting chance to keep more of your hard earned money from the fscking IRS. And it is perfectly legal...
There is NOTHING wrong with being a 1099 contractor, frankly, I think it is much better than being a regular W2 wage slave...and these days, face it, you don't get any more job security as a regular employee than you do as a contractor...so, you might as well contract and get the BILL rate that goes with it.
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no more fucking waiting to *EARN* vacation hours...take them off when you want
you do understand that when a company offers vacation, you get PAID for the time off, right? what you are "earning" is paid time off, not simply the right to take time off.
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That was the point of the parents comments.
so negotiating a fixed amount of vacation ahead of time in your contract qualifies, as the parent post states, "taking time off when you want"?
good try.
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The fact that you can't understand
ooooh here comes the troll!
Nor does completely redefining what they said in order to make yourself look less ignorant. Which, btw, wasn't even a good try.
on the contrary, i was going on ONLY what was said, you're the one that's reading between the lines.
no more fucking waiting to *EARN* vacation hours...take them off when you want
contractors most certainly do not simply take vacation when they want. their clients need things done just as much as an employer needs things done from its employees.
sure you can take as much "vacation" as you want, as long as you don't need the pay. however, i wouldn't count unemployment as as vacation.
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"contractors most certainly do not simply take vacation when they want. "
You don't just say "This week is off limits, I have something scheduled?" Assuming that's well ahead of time, of course, not the day before a week off. I work with 1099s who do exactly that. You can't just decide Monday morning that you're going to take a week off, but you can schedule it at your own pleasure, which if we translate, means whenever you want. If you have a contract that specifies otherwise, you are sucking the syphil
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You can't just decide Monday morning that you're going to take a week off, but you can schedule it at your own pleasure, which if we translate, means whenever you want.
no, scheduling vacation weeks ahead of time during contract negotiations is not the same as "whenever you want".
and p.s., that's exactly how i've scheduled vacation, as a salaried, employee for 20+ years.
you are sucking the syphilitic cock of an unholy form of government
yep, you are clever.
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I am a regular full time employee where I work.
so i guess you know what you're talking about then.
Vacations that any company gives you are not free time or vacations. You are paying for them by getting a lower salary/rate.
weird. everywhere i've worked, i've always made significantly more than the contractors.
roughly 1.8% more pay per hour
references? no? okay then.
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"driving to/from job site is a good one" ... get a lawyer!). That sa
Mind you I'm in Canada, but this is specifically NOT in the rules for allowable travel if to/from work sites if part of regular routine. Plus here, you have to log all hours travelled if you're expensing against a 'company car'. Travel as far as I have determined only applies between multiple job sites in the performance of said job (like plummer from one job to the next, but not to/from home. Maybe if your home is also your official office
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When I was referring to expensing travel, I was referring to the mileage you get to write off for gas. I'm working from home now, so not up on current value, but it used to be like $0.58/mi or so? When doing this I just kept a log book in the car and recorded the odometer start and end when traveling to job site,etc.
CA won't take that from you? You should still be able
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Then the answer is "Sorry if I've caused you a bit of trouble, eh?"
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We do so long as the compensation is appropriate for it. If you're working through an agency and being paid the same as you would working W-2, then you're almost certainly losing money doing it since you have to cover your half of Social Security, in addition to doing quarterly taxes and generally keeping up with more paperwork as you mentioned.
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There's nothing magical or that difficult about paying your own benefits!! Medical is easy, just get a high deductible policy (and many of them since obama care came out are this way) of about $1200 deductible, you can also set up a HSA (Health Savings Account) and sock away about $3K annually pre-tax....for your routine meds and co-pays, etc.
Bullshit. The cheapest high deductible ObamaCrap policy that my wife and I (both contractors) can get in MN has a $13,000 out of pocket and costs us $8000 a year. For insurance we don't use.
Yeah, it's easy but it ain't cheap. All we want is a catastrophic policy, but we are forced to buy a POS that don't need in order to grease the pockets of Obama's campaign contributors. And this crap is going up approximately 50% in 2016. We'll probably drop the crap and just pay the fine. We'll save a lot of money. "B
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Oh, you forsaw and forreplied to my reply with the old "classic high deductible catastrophic policy" crap? Do you realize how much of my paycheck goes to insurance? Do you know how much of my employer's contribution goes towards insurance?
You probably don't. But you probably get paid for it. If you don't know, you really should find out. And if you aren't paid for it, you really should re-negotiate.
I don't care how much it costs. I care whether you get paid above rate to com
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I'm in a similar boat here. Did you perchance look into healthshares? I've been meaning to research them myself, but maybe you've already looked into them?
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Assuming the policy you're talking about covers two people -- your wife and you -- that's $333 per month per person. That's not that bad, man.
Re: Sit down, shut up, and do your work... until.. (Score:2)
$1200 is not a high deductible, and hasn't been for some time.
I was a W-2 contractor for 7 years until corporate policy forced them to convert me. Got my 2009 15% pay cut back, fully covered the difference in health insurance, and got paid vacation - net win. No more or less job security.
But I've also done 1099 work, and it took me a while to get the hang of it. When I did, I focused exclusively on getting the work done. This gave me really mornings, really early end of days, and most Fridays off. And,
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As many idiots as there are posting here, I just want to state for the record that I less than three your post. "a bit of paperwork ... hire a CPA" sounds like a lot of time to me.
Different in different places (Score:2)
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Was just going to say. We've got a guy at work that isn't a contractor by any definition of the word, but he likes it that way for everything you just said.
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My first software development internship out of College was for a decent sized insurance company who's programming workforce involved about 100 in house employees and 100 working as contractors. The contractors worked the same hours, used the same equipment, worked on the same teams, and in all general job aspects were identical to the contractors, but the in house employees had benefits and were allowed to attend company events, while the interns and contractors were barred from participating in any event
That's great and all (Score:2)
You're also skirting unemployment insurance. Remember, unemployment is _not_ for you to take. It's there so you don't end up competing in a race to the bottom with desperate wage slaves when the economy takes a min
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Because they live in the real world, not some socialist thought experiment.
Unions are dead. Get over it.
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It's not that unions are dead. Unions are very much alive in some places and working for everyone's betterment. Many nurses' unions fall into this.
Unions have seriously declined (they peaked at only about a third of all workers in the 1950s), but that's because protections have been built into the law to ensure that most of those things unions fought for are available to all workers.
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Show floors are one of the places where union control got *WAY* out of hand. When someone paying to rent space for a booth can get into trouble--and sometimes even be fined--for emptying a trash can because of union rules, it's gone overboard. It contributes to the sky-high cost of exhibits and puts small companies at a disadvantage.
Re: What does your union think? (Score:2)
American unions aren't dead, they are just corporations allegedly devoted to the related of their members.
In reality, most are devoted to taking large salaries, ensuring their continued existence, and influencing legislation to achieve those goals.
When their members realize they have TWO corporate masters, where non union workers only have ONE, then things can change. And as the unions strangle their corporate adversaries, they shed members. Eventually the leadership 'retires'.
Re: What does your union think? (Score:2)
Make that "devoted to the welfare of their members.". Touch keyboards...
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Actually...someone is looking to really FUCK UP a good thing many of us have going.....