Lawmakers Risk Repeating A Disaster With The PRO Act

America’s independent contractors are generally free to choose their clients, the work they do, and their hours of operation. It’s an arrangement that works for them and their schedules: Nearly eight-in-ten prefer their independent status.

Some lawmakers are calling this a crisis. In March, the House passed the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, or the PRO Act, which would, among other things, take away these workers’ independence and reclassify them as traditional employees under the National Labor Relations Act. The bill would also scrap every right-to-work law in the country, a move designed to push more workers into unions, often without their consent.

But the PRO Act is a poor solution to a crisis that doesn’t actually exist.

Do these lawmakers know better than the 80 percent of contract and freelance workers who are happy with their arrangements? Let’s consider the facts.

The PRO Act would rely on an ABC test, an arbitrary and overly complicated tool federal regulators would use to determine whether a worker should be properly considered an employee or an independent contractor.

The test is explicitly designed to revoke the independent status of these workers. Then, lawmakers hope, their clients would simply hire them and place them on payroll. Problem solved, right?

Unfortunately, every issue seems simple when you don’t know much about it.

Lawmakers should first ask themselves a few important questions: Which of the freelance photographer’s many clients do lawmakers plan to hire? How will the independent copywriter with chronic health problems balance a traditional employment schedule when he needs flexible hours to manage his medical needs?

Will the company with dozens, or even hundreds, of freelance workers be able to place them all on payroll — or will it let many of them go?

Will the mall put its Santa Claus on the payroll year-round?

To answer those questions, Congress need look no further than California, which in 2019 tried its hand at similar legislation: Assembly Bill 5. Golden State lawmakers reclassified independent contractors in countless professions, from software developers to truckers, hair stylists to opera singers.

The law — the one intended to end a nonexistent crisis — instead created an actual one. Photographers struggled to grapple with nonsensical limits on the number of content submissions they could send to their clients. One resident lost his job as a court transcript editor and had difficulty making money as a bass player.

Freelance writers lost income, and many lost their jobs entirely, when their publications were forced to cut ties with them and couldn’t afford to hire them back. Some outlets blacklisted California writers. So, if you want to cover local California issues as a freelance journalist, it helps if you don’t live in California.

The blowback from the public for AB 5’s failure was swift and intense. So, state lawmakers began passing legislation to offer carveouts to industries hurt by the law.

It was too late. The damage to California’s 2 million independent contractors had already been done.

Will history repeat itself, or will Congress learn from the mistakes of California’s experiment and avoid pushing the same bad policies on the tens of millions of Americans who earn a living from independent contracting?

Americans must be allowed to work the way they want. We should expand worker freedom, not shrink it. PRO Act advocates don’t see it that way, which is why the bill would repeal right-to-work laws in 27 states.

Protecting the right of workers to work without being forced to join a union or pay mandatory dues is enshrined in our state constitution. The PRO Act would negate those protections.

It also would force employers to give the private information of their employees, such as email addresses and phone numbers, to union organizers, something that could expose them to pressure tactics and intimidation.

Simply put, the PRO Act would be disastrous for workers. There is no crisis in independent contracting. But some lawmakers are intent on creating one.

Kat Cammack represents Florida’s Third Congressional District. Skylar Zander is state director of Americans for Prosperity-Florida.