Gig work has been the subject of intense scrutiny in recent years as an increasingly important facet of California’s business landscape. The primary debate centers on worker classification — the distinction between whether a worker is considered an employee or an independent contractor under state and federal law. Employers in California would benefit from reviewing the legal arguments and conditions surrounding gig work to ensure their compliance with the law.
The term “gig work” is broad in scope and subject to different definitions, according to Jennifer Shaw, an attorney at Shaw Law Group in Sacramento, Calif. “I think of gig work as sort of one-off work,” she said.
“It is highly project-specific,” agreed Joseph Beachboard, an attorney at Beachboard Consulting Group in Torrance, Calif. Additionally, when people think of gig work, “they’re usually thinking there’s some electronic component to it, like an app or some kind of on-demand system for connecting the service provider to whoever is utilizing the service,” he added.
This colloquial definition of gig work stems from our digital society. “I think as we’ve seen more technology,” Beachboard said, people “have become more comfortable with [technology] as a mechanism for hiring service providers,” whether for hailing a taxi or finding someone to walk their dog. This normalization has caused the gig industry in California to grow ever larger.
Shaw emphasized that the role of...
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