AB5 – ABC test for cam girl industry

The California Assembly Bill 5, expected to be in force by January 2020, adds some complexity to the relationship between companies and freelance webcam girls. In some circumstances, those who worked as freelancers may be reclassified as employees. It seems like some webcam girls could sue their Californian studio to become employees.

The following text is not legal advice.

Here is the test to determine whether a business partner is an employee or a freelancer.

A – The worker is free from the control and direction of the hirer in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of such work and in fact.

Relationship between adult chat company and cam girl – A is OK

The cam girl is free from the control and direction of the recruiter. The adult chat website does not order the cam girl to act in a certain way. So, we can say that clause A is confirmed between the adult chat site company and the cam girl.

Relationship between studio and cam girl – A is not OK

In this scenario, studio employees give orders to the webcam girl during the show. In this case, a webcam girl working on the premises could sue the studio company to get reclassified as an employee rather than a contractor.

It is also possible to modify the relationship between the studio and the cam girls. Orders may become suggestions. This requires changing the semantics. In France, Uber Eats and Deliveroo asked their employees to use special words with freelancers to avoid issues. For example, they never call someone an employee; they call delivery men “partners.” They don’t talk about a job but refer to a “mission” or “project.”

Outside the webcam girl industry, in Western Europe, some companies only hire contractors if they have a corporation. They do this to prevent being sued by a contractor and asked to reclassify a contractor as an employee. That’s why they ask contractors if they own a corporation before starting. So, for instance, in our example, we can imagine that a Californian studio could ask cam girls to set up a company before working as a cam girl. They could ask the camgirl to act as an LLC, S-corp, or C-corp before starting. Thus, the studio would sign with a company rather than an individual. However, looking at the Californian bill, I don’t know if the studio would be protected. In Europe, to this day, we have no occurrence of a legal proceeding involving a one-man company (our version of the LLC) and a contracting company (the “hiring” company). All the legal proceedings involved freelancers who acted under their individual names.

Since camgirls work from the premises of studios, the line can be really thin between being a contractor and an employee.

B – The worker performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business.

Relationship between adult chat company and cam girl – B is OK

An adult chat website like Chaturbate, LiveJasmin, or Stripchat provides a streaming technology service to users (webcam girls). On the other hand, the webcam girl’s service is to interact with website users using the streaming technology provided.

Relationship between studio and cam girl – B is OK

A webcam girl’s job is to interact with users of a website. Camgirls rent studio equipment. These two activities are very different from each other.

C – The worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as the work performed for the hiring entity.

In this case, the webcam girl may work on different platforms as a webcam girl. The webcam girl is free to work on different websites. C is OK for both the relationship between the adult chat site & the cam girl, and the studio and the cam girl.

Conclusion:

The California Assembly Bill 5 is a problem for studios in California. I think that studios would need to change the way they market their jobs. In the future, I guess that studios should look like music room rentals.

Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Assembly_Bill_5_(2019)