Orange County Employment Lawyers Blog
Over the past few years, we have seen a lot of job growth in California, including the greater Los Angeles area. A recent news article from the Los Angeles Times suggests that we will continue to experience significant job growth as the economy continues to improve, but that growth will be slower over 2016 and 2017 than it had been in the 2015.
The Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation has just released its annual comprehensive report that predicts the 7 percent unemployment rate, which we have now, will fall by just over a point by next year.
With respect to the different types of jobs, non-agricultural jobs are expected increase the employment rate by around 2.5 percent after rising 3 percent in 2015. Next year, the development corporation predicts there will be another 1.5 percent increase. The increases we have seen in the past were at a faster rate than the rest of the United States experienced over that same period of time, and the future increases are also predicted to outpace national economic and employment growth.
In terms of actual numbers, there were nearly 97,000 new jobs in Los Angeles County last year, which accounts for significant rate of growth. One of the main areas where we are seeing increases is in the healthcare industry. This is not surprising, as we have seen a lot of growth in the healthcare sector in our area over the past few years. Another area that we are seeing a lot of growth is the technology sector. As we have seen, Los Angeles is becoming a major technology hub, and increases in jobs have matched or exceeded the growth we have seen in Silicon Valley.
It should be noted, however, that much of this growth is in what is being called the on-demand economy. These are people working full time for app-based services like Uber, which provides rides to people, or Washio, which has a mobile laundry app where you can get someone to pick up your clothes and return them washed and folded. The company hires drivers to take the clothing to and from the laundry operations.
While new jobs are always a good thing, and these workers might be unemployed if these on-demand jobs didn’t exist, there are still quite a few problems. One of the main problems deals with an area of labor law in California known as employee misclassification. The problem is that these workers should be classified as employees, as verified by two recent labor commission decisions, but they are being hired as independent contractors. Independent contractors are not considered employees and are therefore not entitled to overtime, insurance benefits, sick days, vacation days, family leave under the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and a variety of other benefits.
If you believe you are a victim of employee misclassification in Los Angeles, you should contact an employment attorney as soon as possible to see if you have a valid claim. Another area in which there are major problems with employee misclassification is when an employee is injured on the job. If a worker is classified as an employee and is injured on the job, he or she would be entitled to receive workers’ compensation benefits. This is not true for independent contractors.
Contact the employment attorneys at Nassiri Law Group, practicing in Orange County, Riverside and Los Angeles. Call 949.375.4734.
Additional Resources:
California economy is poised to grow in 2016 and 2017, report says, February 17, 2016, LA Times, By Shan Li
More Blog Entries:
Workers’ Compensation and Employee Misclassification Issues, Jan. 19, 2016, Orange County Farm Worker Rights Lawyer