Then there would be less woe – for me, at least, because you wouldn’t be making up silly names to call me, so unlike the professional and successful attorney you apparently claim to be.

You’re mad because I didn’t approve of your buying LL land for lower than the base price of $1,000 by using an unintended back door to get in and make low bids. (And I believe I also said we were all better off without you.)

As for the 1099 business, it isn’t – as few things ever are – a black-and-white issue. However, in the case of these greeters, I think it is good evidence that these are not regular employees, and fall into the 1099 category.

I work on contracts that require assignments to be completed or the contract has not been met. I do this on my own time, by deadline, and not in the offices of the contractor. My employer most definitely controls what I do, but I am without doubt a 1099 employee.

I am very much a “clear-cut independent contractor, so yes, there is such a thing, and it is indeed a good thing to be, from the employee’s standpoint.

(And in this case, I think the individuals are pretty clearly independent contractors as well, though not as clearly as I am.)

My husband, on the other hand, used to teach summer art camp at an art center. For years, these three-month employees were treated as contract labor. The IRS made them start treating them as regular (if part-time) staff – albeit without any benefits whatsoever.

The art center didn’t like that, but it seemed to me the IRS ruling was correct in that instance.

So there are all shades and flavors of this, but I believe the ESC greeters are clearly 1099 employees, as opposed to the more iffy situations, such as the one I mentioned about the art center.

coco

Under common-law rules, anyone who performs services for you is your employee if you can control what will be done and how it will be done. This is so even when you give the employee freedom of action. What matters is that you have the right to control the details of how the services are performed.

If ESC was controlling what will be done by the greeters and how it was done, even something as simple as a Greeter SOP, then it looks like the IRS made a correct judgement. From what I gathered, ESC made the geeters sign things like NDA’s, had a set number f hours they had to work a week (even if they got to choose when), and such. That seems pretty controlling. That line about “even when you give employee freedom of action” is the clincher. Everything else is just smoke and mirrors.

It’s almost like a court case, TBH. Looks like the employee went in with better information than what ESC did, and the IRS ruled accordingly. It’s too late now to go back on the matter, doubly so with that e-mail. That’s just opening doors to a lawsuit, and to follow the blunt letters of the law, (IRS made a ruling, ESC publicly states they will not follow ruling), illegal. Good luck ESC.

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Marc Woebegone is back!

Whereas the omniscient and infallible Prokofy somehow does have the full story (even though the complete facts in this case are not yet a matter of public record) and is therefore able to bless us all with his flawless pronouncement that the case is “clear-cut”.

No, the truth is that nobody commenting here — not Prokofy, not me, not anyone else — knows all the facts. And, as Prokofy’s lawyers have surely told him, this is a highly fact-dependent area of law. The fact that the IRS made an initial determination that these are employees is, as others have observed, not the final word. It might even be wrong. But, it is at least an indication that the facts are less than clear-cut. It is pitifully irresponsible for anyone to make sweeping assertions based on incomplete facts gleaned from blog posts, one-sided public statements and cover-your-ass memos. Any lawyer who did so would be subject to a malpractice claim. Anyone else who does so is simply foolish.

Or are government run bureaucracies infallible? I’ve worked as a contractor (as both sole proprietor and owner / primary member of an LLC) many times in my life, and this is definitely contract work.

If Mommy doesn’t give you what you want, go to Daddy, right? Either way they have to go back through the same caseworker, otherwise the IRS will be pissed that they’re wasting time. Where’s Giff? Normally he’d be here going off by now