The PRO Act of 2023
With a different Congress now in session, the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, essentially a national version of California’s AB-5 law, is attempting to make its way through the chambers of Congress to become a law.
Details
This will mark the third iteration of the PRO Act that we have covered. The short version is that AB-5 and the PRO Act were and are both intended to prevent worker abuse from misclassification of employees as independent contractors. California AB-5 has, since becoming law, had ramifications beyond its original scope of “gig economy” companies such as DoorDash, with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that it applied to trucking as well. The battle regarding AB-5 in trucking still goes on to this day.
The latest version of the Bill has passed the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions in an 11-10 vote, along party lines. It will now go to the Senate to be voted upon by all 100 members.
The revival of the PRO Act has been met with criticism from industry members. Todd Spencer, head of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, has since penned a letter to the Senate.
“The owner-operator model has a well-established history and provided millions of truckers the
opportunity to be true independent contractors and small-business entrepreneurs. As a leased
owner-operator, a trucker leases their equipment to a carrier and agrees to operate the equipment under the motor carrier’s authority. There are federal regulations, known as Truth-in-Leasing (TIL) Regulations (49 CFR § 376.12), that dictate specific requirements for these leases that help protect truckers and the public. Through this model, leased owner-operators work with motor carriers as independent contractors. These practices have been in place for well over 40 years, far predating recent discussions around worker classification and the “gig economy””, he writes. He also provided an alternative solution to help truckers, which was to remove the overtime exemption for them in the Fair Labor Standards Act, which Spencer argues would do more good for truckers than abolishing the owner-operator model used in most states.
Conclusion
Every time a Bill is reintroduced into Congress, it is another battle on both sides to get it passed or to stop it dead in its tracks.
The chances it will become law in 2023? Less likely than in years prior, as the House of Representatives, which once passed the PRO Act, is now predominantly Republican. At least six more Republicans would have to cross party lines than Democrats in order for it to pass the House. We are fairly certain that both chambers would only need a simple majority, as Biden is all but certain to approve of the Bill.
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