Independent contractor rules are as strict as ever. Whether or not you’re an employee or a contractor is a long-running question for many small business individuals.
The subject has become trickier, as the courts are vague and tort lawyers have been given more leeway by judges and juries who know little about business.
The rule of thumb for employers is this: If you control how a worker performs, he or she is an employee, not a contractor. Tell the hired person how and when to report to work and you have an employee, not a contractor. Also, when you provide tools for work, you have an employee. Tricky vagueness comes about when a question arises how important the job is to an employer’s business.
You can be a genuine contractor by all conventional definitions and still be considered by some courts an employee of a business. Sharp lawyers come in to help make a complaint against the boss and trouble starts. (See the Earl J. Weinreb NewsHole® comments and @BusinessNewshole at Twitter.)
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