Labor and Employment Law
Ca. Labor & Emp't Rev. September 2018, Volume 32, No. 5
Content
- Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court: Employees' Perspective
- Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis: Employees' Perspective
- Janus v. Afscme: Employers' Perspective
- Janus v. Afscme: Employees' Perspective
- Masthead
- Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court: Employers' Perspective
- Labor & Employment Law Section Executive Committee 2017-2018
- Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis: Employers' Perspective
- Wage and Hour Case Notes
- Nlra Case Notes
- From the Editors Editorial Policy
- Inside the Law Review
- Public Sector Case Notes
- Message From the Chair
- Cases Pending Before the California Supreme Court
- Employment Law Case Notes
Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court: Employees’ Perspective
By Cornelia Dai
Cornelia Dai is a partner at Hadsell Stormer & Renick, LLP, a private plaintiff-side law firm in Southern California. She specializes in employment, wage and hour, and civil rights law, with a focus on class actions and complex litigation.
The California Supreme Court’s unanimous 82-page decision in Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court1 resoundingly answered the call for protection of employees in a time of rampant independent contractor misclassification fueled by a changing economy. Dynamex clarifies that the broad "suffer and permit to work" definition for "employ," found in California’s wage orders, is the appropriate standard for determining whether a worker is an employee or an independent contractor.
Adopting the ABC test to determine whether a worker was suffered or permitted to work, Dynamex holds that a worker is presumed to be an employee, and that the hiring entity must satisfy all three conditions of the ABC test to overcome the presumption and establish the worker is an independent contractor. The ABC test should prove to be a more difficult test for hiring companies to meet than the multifactor "right to control" test under S.G. Borello & Sons, Inc. v. Department of Industrial Relations.2