One of the most intractable problems in employment law is, sometimes, knowing whether someone working for someone else is an “employee” or not. Getting that right – or wrong – can have enormous legal consequences for the worker and person or firm by which the worker has been engaged. One might think that making such a distinction would always be pretty easy.
Alas, not so. Courts, and executive agencies charged with enforcing the law, have long struggled with that very question.
The Trump Administration has now weighed in. The U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”), on February 26, 2026, published a “notice of proposed rule” (the “Notice”) to “help workers and employers better understand how to determine when a worker is an employee and when the worker may be classified as an independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act and related federal laws.” The goal, says the related news release at https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20260226, is to “make it easier to properly differentiate between employees with the protections under the Fair Labor Standards Act and those workers who work as independent contractors.”
The “preamble” in the Notice – which explains why the goal should be attempted at all – is about 135 pages long. That the explanation is so long makes one wonder what to expect of the promised simplicity...
Kenneth Scott Miller, 48, is charged with a felony count of making a false report to law enforcement. He was released from the Escambia County Jail on a $500 bond. According to an Escambia County ...