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California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

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Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#281

Post by r3trohack3r »

mountainofdeath wrote: post #240
r3trohack3r wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only a availability heuristic, but I closed 2 consulting contracts that were a _hard_ "no we don't hire contractors" by letting them know I don't live in California. Conversation changed as soon as they realized I was under AZ law for contracting/consulting services. I was charging $10k per week, and one contract was a total of 6 months. The total value of that contract was $240k (before my expenses and taxes). That…

Correct me if I am wrong but the only material differences between contractor and employee status are 1. Who pay's the employer side income taxes. Contractors pay both sides. 2. Not eligible for benefits, you have to go to overpriced open market. 3. The contractor can deduct reasonable expenses they incur. 4. A contract will not necessarily be renewed whereas for an employee, the assumption is the job will be there i…

I can't speak definitively to this, I wasn't in their seat.

By my understanding is that they were concerned about the liability of a consultant/contractor under CA law because you can retroactively be relabled as an employee at any point in the future causing the business to be liable for unpaid taxes and possibly benefits?

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#282

Post by networkchad »

535188B17C93743 wrote: post #223
Guvante wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A computer uses 150kWh/year @ $0.42/kWh that is $75/year. Certainly internet is possible at $60/month so $720/year. Say you have a generous $500/5 years for equipment plan and you are still below $1,000/year/employee. Yes there are other expenses but you should already be providing a PC etc. How are you getting to millions at a small company? Certainly a shop with 3,000 people is out a few million but... You have 3,0…

$0.42/kWh!??! Jesus Christ. I think I'm paying around $0.0629/kWh. Where is this?

[dead]

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#283

Post by valianteffort »

kevingadd wrote: post #264
valianteffort wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And a lot of people were stuck buying at inflated prices.

That's your mistake, it's not their responsibility to make you rich

I never said that. What the previous gent said was he wanted property prices artificially lowered.

I'm simply saying those who were stuck buying at inflated prices might be opposed to that.

My home is paid off and I got it for half of it's market value. I have no skin in the game either way as I'd never sell.

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#284

Post by manicennui »

petercooper wrote: post #41

This is a bit of a tangent but the post references an attitude in both the US and UK tax codes that grinds my gears: If, on the other hand, you feel you are a more effective leader if you stay abreast of developing news, but doing so is not part of your job duties, then subscriptions to various newspapers are not "necessary" for you to do your job and would not be reimbursable. This is a discouraging factor for emplo…

My employer will reimburse us for books and pays for conference attendance. The people who seem to benefit from this are the people who would have sought out the information on their own. Most employees won't do anything more than is required of them or demanded by their manager, and conferences are basically seen as an excuse to not work for a couple days by most of my coworkers.

I personally pay for O'Reilly's service, which my employer used to provide, and just see it as an expense of my profession. I'm also paid drastically more than average because I'm knowledgable about more things and have more ideas to draw from.

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#285

Post by dheera »

valianteffort wrote: post #203
civilitty wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Californian who has lived here for a quarter century and has never threatened to leave, I’m glad the state doesn’t cater to startups who can’t afford an extra 5% for home office expenses for their remote workers. They have zero loyalty to the state and if all employees are remote there’s little benefit keeping the corp in CA. Everyone has to register to do business here and the FTB will get the bulk of its cut a…

And destroy the property values of all the people that worked their whole lives to own a home there. You're being myopic or selfish, neither is fair to your neighbors.

> destroy the property values

So if I invent an awesome new car, it's selfish because it's destroying the value of your beater? If I invent a new GPU that costs 1/10 the price of existing ones, it's selfish because your computer is now worthless on the secondary market?

Homes are to LIVE in, I consider them consumables just like cars, just on the order of ~a lifetime instead of ~10 years. I don't give a flying f about neighbors' house or car values, I just care that I have a comfortable roof to live under and that I can afford it.

I know boomers treat houses as investment assets. I don't. They're shitty return and high-maintainence as an investment. But I'd like to have my own so I can modify the hell out of it to my liking.

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#286

Post by atomicfiredoll »

vineyardmike wrote: post #205
FireBeyond wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For small businesses and startups, this can amount to millions of dollars of additional expenses. There's an adjustment needed. I have worked for and applied to healthcare startups that want you to BYO device. For working on PHI. In Production. We're not "all in this together". We all know that equity is worth nothing until proven otherwise. Stop cheaping out and expecting your employees to invest in your success w…

> If that means fewer/smaller startups, small businesses? Ultimately, so be it. People rush to claim that XYZ will hurt businesses, glossing over the fact that the alternative hurts employees. It’d sure be better for small businesses if pay was optional and employment could be forced but that doesn’t sound like a very nice world. The government could also make no taxes, give out free money, and give every company fre…

> glossing over the fact that the alternative hurts employees.

...And, potentially, the planet.

In my mind it's reasonable to expect employers to cover costs of things like equipment. But, I do wonder how much CA is considering it's own interests here. It seems like this could be abused to do things like bring people back to downtown areas impacted by COVID or lightly discourage hiring employees who don't live in state (and therefore pay sales tax.) That case could also end poorly for society (and the planet.)

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#287

Post by x86x87 »

lopkeny12ko wrote: post #99

Many young people or those cheering for employee/consumer rights do not seem to understand that this does more net harm than good. For small businesses and startups, this can amount to millions of dollars of additional expenses. Like any economically rational entity, your employer is going to respond by reducing headcount, not hiring in CA anymore, cutting costs in your annual raises, or some combination of the above…

nah. if you cannot afford this you cannot afford to have a business.

also this is not just CA. your employer is literally stealing money from you when you are using your own resources to get the job done.

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#288

Post by twelve40 »

civilitty wrote: post #147
timtom39 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My company is largely remote at this point and is moving away from CA for cost/tax reasons. For some portion of companies this is just one more reason to move headquarters. That being said, I live in a pretty population dense area and my largest cost by far is dedicated home office space. It would be nice for my company to pay for that but it would have also been nice for them to pay for gas for my commute when I had…

As a Californian who has lived here for a quarter century and has never threatened to leave, I’m glad the state doesn’t cater to startups who can’t afford an extra 5% for home office expenses for their remote workers. They have zero loyalty to the state and if all employees are remote there’s little benefit keeping the corp in CA. Everyone has to register to do business here and the FTB will get the bulk of its cut a…

confused. If all of this is about remote workers, how are they taking up "the space" here? aren't most of them in the lower COL areas freeing up the space while the company pays the CA taxes?

Re: California employers must reimburse remote workers for all necessary expenses

#289

Post by chasd00 »

lm28469 wrote: post #72
kortilla wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Working from the kitchen table doesn’t work if you have a family or really anyone else in the house.

A desk in the bedroom works well enough. You don't "need" an extra room, I've never had an extra room and I've been working from home in all my jobs

don't skimp on a chair though. A good chair goes a long ways in keeping you from getting tired before the day is done.
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