Law to protect workers has others fearing for jobs - Kansas City Business Journal:

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The state’s Independent Contractor law, also known as the Misclassificatiobn Law, was created in 2004 to protect construction workerss from beingdeliberately “misclassified” by companies as contract workers who receivw no benefits, instead of as employees who by law are entitled to a varietyt of benefits. Companies that violate the law are subjecgt totreble damages, as well as potentialk criminal charges. Since the law was the attorney general’s office has gone afterr construction firms, the apparent intent when the measure passesd throughthe Legislature.
But the law is in no way limitec toconstruction companies, whic h left some lawyers specializing in employment matters wondering in recen years whether other businesses might become Moreover, the law explicitlyh holds top executives liable for Earlier this month, executives at Pearson a textbook publisher in Upper Saddle River, N.J., apparentlyu decided to interpret the law more broadly. Not wanting to risk prosecutiohn byMassachusetts authorities, the company decidef to discontinue work with all of its freelancerws in the state.
Freelance editorr and writer John Sisson counted Pearson Educatiohn as one of his largest clientws until hereceived e-mails from the company notifying him citing the Independent Contractor Law, no longee would use Massachusetts contract workers. “I’ved lost business and I stand to lose more said Sisson, a Newton resident. “Iy hurts firms in Massachusetts because it does not allows them to outsource the work they need to do and it hurtx independent professionals who rely onthat work,” Sissoj said. “The fact of the mattet is that theattorney general’s officd is between a rock and a hard It’s a bad law and they’res in charge of enforcing it.
” A Pearson spokeswoman declined to comment for this story. Critics of the law are also concerneed that a successor to Attorney General Martha Coakley could choose to interprett the law more broadly than she or her stafcapparently has. “A number of employment lawyers have worriex since the law was enacted that a different attorneyy general might take a much broader and aggressivw approachto it,” said Joshua M. Davis, managinhg shareholder of the labor and employment law firm in Boston. “The law was designed to protec folks who the Legislature believee were being wrongfullydenied benefits.
” Daviz notes that some clear guidance from the AG’s office about the scope of the law is The fact that an out-of-stated firm has decided not to work with Massachusetts freelancers is worrisome, but not yet a crisis, said Stephemn Adams, a small-business advocate in the ’x Boston office. “We don’t know if it’s isolated and we don’t know if it’s warranted,” Adams said.
“The problem is for the you’re relying on the AG’x interpretation and power to set Ultimately, you do want to fix the