I have done a lot of independent contractor work in New Jersey, defended many such cases, from (numerous) unemployment audits to FLSA class actions. The New Jersey test, the A-B-C test, is well-established and one of the hardest for the putative employer to prevail upon. The test was, just a few years ago, reinforced by the NJ Supreme Court. Now, Governor. Phil Murphy has signed an Executive Order creating a task force to look into this issue of employee misclassification, as the Governor opines that millions and millions of dollars in taxes are being lost because of this practice. My question is—why do it?
The Task Force on Employee Misclassification will make recommendations on strategies the state will use to deal with the arguably widespread misclassification of employees as independent contractors. The Task Force will look at existing enforcement practices in and will seek to set out best practices to strengthen enforcement in this area, as well as making education outreach.
The Executive Order states that “with some audits suggesting that misclassification deprives New Jersey of over $500 million in tax revenue every year.” The Order is a product of a NJDOL report issued during the transition that contained a section on misclassifying workers. The report referenced a fairly new NJ Supreme Court case on misclassification and USDOL guidance which had “clarified the factors to be examined in determining a worker’s status.” The Report cited some benefits (UI insurance, family leave) that employees receive and independent contractors do not.
The NJDOL audits, in supposedly random fashion, approximately 2% of employers to gauge if these employers are correctly reporting all employees for unemployment and disability insurance purposes. I have handled perhaps fifty (50) such audits and can safely say that the tendency of the agency is to find that most individuals are, in fact, employees.
Under the IRS test, many factors are looked at, with a seeming emphasis on the control factors. Under the New Jersey A-B-C test, the most important factor is whether the individual is in an “independently established business.” This third factor is where, nine of ten times, the putative employer’s defense goes south. However, there has been a recent judicial development (the Garden State Fireworks decision) that might swing the pendulum a little back towards the middle.
The Takeaway
One commentator has said that the classification “disease” affects all industries but asserted that the problem is pervasive in the construction, trucking and landscaping spheres. That may be so but I know that the state of enforcement by the NJDOL is already fairly aggressive and I do not understand the point of the task force being created. If it is to advise that there is “a lot” of misclassification, well, we already know that. Maybe the Task Force will recommend stronger and more aggressive enforcement of the existing laws.
From my vantage point, I thought the agency was already doing that…
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