{"id":66317,"date":"2025-08-14T00:17:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-14T00:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/66317\/"},"modified":"2025-08-14T00:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T00:17:08","slug":"siekerka-on-nj101-5-njdol-rule-proposal-tone-deaf-to-independent-contractors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/66317\/","title":{"rendered":"Siekerka on NJ101.5: NJDOL Rule Proposal Tone Deaf to Independent Contractors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>While the New Jersey Department of Labor\u2019s rule proposal to greatly reduce the number of independent contractors <a href=\"https:\/\/njbia.org\/district-13-lawmakers-to-propose-bill-to-nullify-njdol-independent-contractor-rule\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">took a major hit this week<\/a>, NJBIA President and CEO Michele Siekerka said at its core, the state proposal is tone deaf to today\u2019s workforce.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with NJ101.5 top-rated morning host Eric Scott this morning, Siekerka said \u00a0\u201cmore people are becoming gig workers because they want and need the flexibility in their work schedule.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd let&#8217;s just take a little sideline here,\u201d Siekerka told Scott. \u201cLet&#8217;s talk about working parents who, especially since post COVID, have been looking for more of that flexibility.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese are people who make their livelihood by having multiple companies that they work for. And you&#8217;re now going to tell these folks you have to go be employed by a company?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd the reverse of this is you&#8217;ve made it absolutely impossible for companies that employ gig workers. We heard that from the businesses affected on the other side,\u201d Siekerka said.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday, Senator Declan O\u2019Scanlon, Assemblyman Gerry Scharfenberger, and Assemblywoman Vicky Flynn (R-13) <a href=\"https:\/\/njbia.org\/district-13-lawmakers-to-propose-bill-to-nullify-njdol-independent-contractor-rule\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">announced they will introduce legislation that would declare NJDOL\u2019s proposal is inconsistent with legislative intent<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The legislators will post the bill upon return of the lawmakers from their summer break if NJDOL doesn\u2019t respond to the massive public outcry opposing the bill and \u201crescind or satisfactorily modify their proposed rule changes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>To date,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/njbia.org\/opposition-to-proposed-independent-contractor-rule-grows\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">21 lawmakers from both sides of the aisle<\/a>\u00a0have already submitted comments urging the Department to pull the rule proposal.<\/p>\n<p>The concurrent resolution, if passed by the Legislature, would not require the governor\u2019s signature.<\/p>\n<p>Siekerka credited Scott for taking calls for bringing attention to the issue regularly on his show, the callers who protested it, freelance worker advocates like Fight for Freelancers\u2019 Kim Kavin and NJBIA lobbyist Elissa Frank for their collective work in protesting the proposal.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI want to say this is a perfect example of true democracy at work,\u201d Siekerka said. \u201cFor the last few months, constituents across the state of New Jersey who are affected by this terrible policy have taken to the phones, have taken to letters, have told their legislators that this is bad policy and it will impact their livelihood.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd you were a big part of that on 101.5, Eric. You were taking these callers every day for weeks and months, and we thank you for that. But the best part of this is now our legislators have listened, and you took their calls too. And they came on and they said, \u2018I hear you. I hear why this is their policy, and I want to ask on your behalf.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the New Jersey Department of Labor\u2019s rule proposal to greatly reduce the number of independent contractors took&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[64,63,99,52678,52679,180,52680,52681],"class_list":{"0":"post-66317","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-eric-scott","12":"tag-independent-contractor-rule","13":"tag-jobs","14":"tag-michele-siekerka","15":"tag-njdol"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}