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Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
I visited a favorite mass club of mine yesterday and discovered that it has become the latest Mass club to put the girls on the books and re-arrange the fee and dance structure in the process. There are no longer any house fees or fines. The ladies pay a $20 a day "locker fee" and tip the DJ. Dance prices have been raised from $20 to $25 and there is now a $5 per dance tariff to the house. The PD area is monitored and the girls have to settle up after every customer.
This is the third club that I visit in Mass that has gone over to this sort of arrangement or something like it. All of this is the end result of several lawsuits brought by dancers over the past few years claiming that they were being unfairly classified as independent contractors when they were, in fact, employees. Well, it turns out the courts agreed so now they are employees! Funny thing is I have yet to meet a dancer who actually likes any of this. Many have bolted for RI or CT clubs and those that haven't are not making as much money as they were. It seems to me that, aside from a few disgruntled girls who were working for some very shady owners most dancers liked it better off the books and under the radar.
I'm curious as to what others may think of this. I've been going to clubs for a very long time. Long enough to remember when dancers in Mass actually got shift pay and stage tips. There was no such thing as a house fee or paying for your schedule back then (the early 80's) You showed up when they told you to, danced your sets, tipped the DJ at the end of the night and kept everything you earned. This was all before the introduction of the private dance which, in my opinion, changed the entire industry.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
Saw it coming after the last court ruling. Sorry but all of the clubs in Mass will follow suit.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
I agree completely. The last lawsuit settled for $600 grand. No club owner in his right mind is going to risk that kind loss if it can be avoided. It's just a matter of time...
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
Yoda, please elaborate on how the advent of private dances changed the industry... (I know how they changed what we expected in a visit to the club, and what we were willing to pay. What I mean is, how did it change how the dancer got paid ? I have probably been going to clubs longer than you, but I didn't think much about these issues until I hit SW.)
I always thought that strippers had been had by the independent contractor classification, because they had to pay to work, but yet they didn't get to set their own work rules.
I will admit to being influenced by Lily Burana's story in Strip City, of the original lawsuit vs Mitchell Bros. in SF, which set the precedent for strippers being employees if they are treated as such. So what I don't get is, why don't the girls you know want to be paid as employees? Especially in the current regime of clubs hiring surplus girls w/ high fees and let only the strong survive?
It seems like some dancers here see the road to extinction paved with ever higher fees and fines. Might not employee status even things out, to the point where the clubs, and the dancers they need to attract their customers can both profit even in these tough times ?
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
majordon
Yoda, please elaborate on how the advent of private dances changed the industry...
It's not so much the advent of the private dance itself but rather the fact that guys were willing to pay a premium price for them. Once club owners realized that a dancer could make $20 for for three or four minutes work or hundreds for an hours work by selling a private dance or VIP time they wanted in on the deal. Various options from per-dance tariffs to room fees became their method for doing this. Eventually the concept of shift pay, as minimal as it sometimes was, gave way to house fees. The concept of "pay for play" became very common in many night clubs that hired musical acts as entertainment in the late 80's and early 90's. A band had to pay the club to perform instead of being paid to perform. Shift fees are the strip club version of that and it's no small coincidence that the strip clubs owners (which are, at there core, simply night clubs with naked women as the entertainment) followed along with what their buddies who owned regular night clubs where doing.
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Originally Posted by
ma.jordon
I always thought that strippers had been had by the independent contractor classification, because they had to pay to work, but yet they didn't get to set their own work rules.
Well, the independent contractor classification has always been tenuous at best (which is why the lawsuits have been successful). The bottom line however was always the money that could be made, the scheduling flexibilty and the ability to fly financially under the radar ( just about every dancer I know pays taxes but none of them declare all of what they make). Nothing in life is perfect but smart dancers recognize that the positives far outweigh the negatives in the "dancer as independent contractor" equation.
FWIW, I work as an independent contract but I don't get to show up at the jobs I am booked for whenever I want or make my own rules. The difference is I don't have to pay a fee to work. Interestingly, the fees and fines have been the impetus for many of the lawsuits.
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Originally Posted by
majordon
So what I don't get is, why don't the girls you know want to be paid as employees? Especially in the current regime of clubs hiring surplus girls w/ high fees and let only the strong survive?
To be blunt it is because the girls I know are among the strong ones. They where all surviving just fine, even in a bad economy, and enjoying all the the benefits that I mentioned above. The prospect of being on the books alone is enough to have most of the Mass dancers I know considering going to work in RI or CT. Some already have.
The concept of "surplus girls" also grew out of the advent of house fees. A club owner wants a full schedule but he also realizes that the more girls he has on a shift the more he collects in house fees and possible fines. The dancers productivity should be a concern but it often times is not. Not every woman is cut out physically or mentally to be a dancer. The idea of doing it simply because you can make more money than you could at Walmart is pervasive in the industry right now and we are all, good dancer and customer alike, suffering because of it.
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Originally Posted by
majordon
It seems like some dancers here see the road to extinction paved with ever higher fees and fines. Might not employee status even things out, to the point where the clubs, and the dancers they need to attract their customers can both profit even in these tough times ?
I don't see how. Do you honestly think that paying girls a server's wage to show up for work while adding dance tariffs or increasing the ones that already exist is going to put more money in the dancer's pocket? I don't and neither do the women I know who are currently dancing. OK, the $40 house fee goes away but the price of a private dance goes up so the club can take their cut making it more difficult for the dancer to sell dances. Also, keep in mind that, once dancer is an employee the dance fee she charges is actually the club's money and not hers. The club could, in theory, decide that a fifty fifty split of private dance fees is what they want and the dancer's only option is to leave. Will this happen? It's doubtful but it's possible. Again, smart dancers are reading the writing on the wall and not liking it.
Obviously these are my opinions based on my club experiences and those of the dancers that I am friendly with. If there where not dancers out there who believed that there is a better way these lawsuits would not be happening. My POV is pretty simple. Dancing is not for everyone and "fair treatment" in the industry is a myth. If you don't like the club you are working in find another one. This is what successful dancers have always done.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
^Many strippers like their job because of the flexibility that being an independent contractor allows. As an employee, you don't have the freedom to make your own schedule or even just show up when you want to work. Of course, some clubs treat their strippers as employees despite them being considered independent contractors, and they have set schedules and have to pay outrageous fines to skip shifts.
Also, the main benefits of being considered an employee are job security, benefits, and stable pay. Being considered an employee as a stripper doesn't give you any of those benefits. A manager can still tell you to get out and never show your face in the club again, the club won't give you insurance or vacation pay, or pay, period. From what I understood in the OP, the club takes a cut of each lap dance, rather than paying each girl. I bet that technically, the customer pays the CLUB 25$, and then the club pays the girl the 20$ to make it more of an employee dynamic - not a base shift pay.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
well, as employees, hopefully clubs will be a bit pickier about who they hire (i don't know how it is there, but i assume it's like most of the industry, not picky enough). and they'll be liable (i assume) if a dancer is found doing illegal things, so they'll have more incentive to keep out extras girls.
downside...the girls make the same per lapdance, but the guys spend more. so if a guy wants to spend 100 dollars, the dancer is now making 80$ giving 4 dances, instead of 100 doing 5. and the guys might feel a little screwed over by this price change and might decide to get fewer dances than what they can afford.
having done both, i'll tell ya, 20$ dances are a lot easier to sell than 25$ dances. even if the dance you buy is totally different (very low contact vs grinding). it's nuts.
that's the part of all this that seems the worst. they're gonna have to get the hottest, smartest, and most well-mannered girls if they're gonna do well with that switch. and i don't just mean a couple girls like that, i mean all the girls like that. any club trying that without being top tier is gonna sink. yeah, the club will make it's money, but in time, it'll dry up.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
^^^ this issue has been discussed in many other threads. IMHO the bottom line comes down to this ...
When dancers are treated as 'statutory employees', the club then becomes subject to new 'expenses', from the 'employer's share of Social Security tax, to state insurance premiums for mandatory dancer worker's comp and disability coverage, mandatory employee benefits ( which in MA already includes a state equivalent of National Health Care), in addition to the club having to pay 'tipped minimum wage' to all dancers and the club having to employ an accountant to deal with paychecks and tax withholding. While the Social Security tax issue is a 'wash' ( i.e. same dollars formerly paid by independent contractor dancer now get split between 'employer' club and 'employee' dancer ), all the other expenses falling on the club are NEW.
If the same amount of total customer dollars are coming through the front door of the club, and if some of those dollars now need to be shared with state insurance funds, state health care, an accountant, etc. no matter how you look at it there are LESS total dollars remaining to be split between the club and the dancers. And this is before taking into consideration that virtually every dollar earned by 'employee' dancers is going to wind up being officially reported to the IRS and state tax agency as a by-product of the club's payroll system.
My guess is that these 'transitional' changes in prices and dancer payouts aren't very realistic. The club attempting to increase the price of private dances from $20 to $25 in order for the club to scarf a $5 share is also going to result in fewer numbers of private dances being sold thus lower dancer earnings. Also, it would appear that the club has not done its 'homework' in regard to the typical costs associated with worker's comp, disability insurance, mandatory MA medical benefits etc. ... and will quickly resort to the 'part time employee' loophole of mandating that no dancer can work more than 24 hours per week ( thus being classified as part-time ) in order to allow the club to avoid having to pay these costs. This in turn will quickly lead to scheduling squabbles.
PS the $20 a day 'locker rent fee' is illegal for an 'employer' to charge an 'employee' ... or at minimum the 'employee' dancer can opt not to use a locker and not to pay the fee.
PPS the $10-$20 tipout to a DJ is also illegal for an 'employer' to mandate an 'employee' to make. Such a tipout is NOT a legitimate 'employee' business expense tax deduction ... for 'employee' dancers it is legally considered to be a 'voluntary' gratuity just like leaving waitstaff an extra $10 at a restaurant.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
Melonie
PS the $20 a day 'locker rent fee' is illegal for an 'employer' to charge an 'employee' ... or at minimum the 'employee' dancer can opt not to use a locker and not to pay the fee.
PPS the $10-$20 tipout to a DJ is also illegal for an 'employer' to mandate an 'employee' to make. Such a tipout is NOT a legitimate 'employee' business expense tax deduction ... for 'employee' dancers it is legally considered to be a 'voluntary' gratuity just like leaving waitstaff an extra $10 at a restaurant.
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LOL, that was the first thing my fav and I talked about when she told me about the change-over. A house fee is a house fee no matter what you try to call it! As far as the DJ tip-out...well, of course it's "voluntary" ::)
You make a good point about the part time employee status. That would limit dancers to three or four shifts a week in most Mass clubs. Many of the dancers I know, especially day shift girls, are working four or five shifts a week in this economy.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
^^^ I tried to do a bit of additional research for you. While paying out a tipped minimum wage would cost the club around $3 an hour, typical worker's comp and disability insurance premiums would cost the club another $3 an hour. State unemployment insurance premiums have recently been raised sky high and would likely cost the club another $2 an hour. Also, under the Mass health system, any Mass 'employer' with 12 or more employees ( i.e. every strip club ) will be fined $295 per year per employee if that employer does not provide 'employee' health benefit coverage ( which would cost far more than $295 a year). This fine is slated to go to $2000 per employee per year under Obamacare.
Thus there is simply no practical way that a clubowner can allow dancers to work enough hours to cross the legal line between part time and full time status unless the club finds a way to 'pry' an additional $60+ per shift out of dancer earnings to cover mandated 'full time' employee benefit costs, on top of the $40 or so per shift the club must extract to cover the costs of accounting for and paying out minimum wage paychecks to begin with. So this probably means dancers will only be allowed to work three shifts per week ... with an ensuing battle in regard to which girls get scheduled for friday and saturday nights versus lower earnings potential weeknights. In order to find enough dancers to keep the club operating on weeknights, and because the club will now be bound by DOL employee 'fair treatment' laws, odds are that some dancers will be forced to schedule monday plus wednesday plus friday, while other dancers will be forced to schedule tuesday plus thursday plus saturday - with NO dancers being allowed to work both friday and saturday night ( for fear of a DOL complaint and ensuing fines by dancers not allowed to work on friday and/or saturday night).
Well I take that back. The club could also employ a maximum of 11 total employees ( including perhaps 8 dancers, 1 bartender, 1 bouncer, 1 DJ etc.) to avoid the Mass health care fines, provide 'full time' employee comp, disability and unemployment benefits for those full time dancers as required by law, force those dancers to work a minimum of 5 nights a week, and raise the club's percentage 'cut' from private dance money high enough to cover the additional 'employer' costs. This would probably correspond to a 50-50% spiit of all private dance money. Of course this would also probably mean the end of any day shifts, because there is no practical way that a two shift club could stay below the <12 employee exemption from Mass health care fines. With or without those fines there will still be heavy economic pressure due to lower earnings potential day shift dancers falling short on their ability to cover their own minimum wage paychecks plus mandated 'employer' benefit costs out of the number of private dances they are actually able to sell ( i.e. the clubs 'cut' of every full time dancer's daily earnings needs to be in the $100 ballpark in order for the club to 'break even' on minimum wage paychecks plus comp / disability / unemployment insurance premiums ). You tell me if Mass is different, but day shift dancer earnings in general don't normally average $200 a shift in private dance sales ... which would allow a day shift full time 'employee' dancer to 'keep' $100 a shift after the club extracts the necessary $100 to cover its employee paycheck and mandated benefit 'costs' for that day shift dancer. If the dancer is only selling $100 a shift in private dances to start with, and if the club needs to extract the entire $100 to cover its 'costs', this is simply not an economically viable option for the club OR for the day shift dancers.
Because of this, it is highly probable that any 'top shelf' dancers now working in Mass clubs converting to 'employee' dancer treatment will be running for clubs outside the state borders in order to avoid seeing their income potential devastated. This in turn will reduce the average 'quality' of the remaining dancers, which in turn will affect Mass clubs' customer base / spending habits and further reduce earnings potential for the remaining dancers.
My comments are based on the experiences of a NY club who lost a lawsuit and who was forced to treat its dancers as 'employees'. Unlike the developments in Mass, however, in the NY example there were a dozen other clubs nearby that were not bound by the same 'employee' treatment requirement. As a result, all of the 'top shelf' dancers left the club in question ... while remaining dancers turned to heavy duty extras in order to earn a 'decent' amount of money after the 'employee' club raised the club's share of private dance money to 50% in order to cover it's new 'employer' related costs.
I would also add that since the club's 'employer' costs are based on the total reported income of its tipped employees, clubs who treat dancers as 'employees' typically only allow them to report combined income levels of $8 an hour or so. This places the 'employee' dancers between a rock and a hard place since, from an official standpoint, they are only able to claim an income level of $10,000 per year ( or whatever ). If the dancers attempt to report significantly higher earnings through the club's payroll system ( as required by the IRS ) in order to bolster their credit rating / loan eligibility, the club will refuse since every additional dollar in reported earnings also requires the club to spend additional money on 'employer' SSI tax, on comp / disability / unemployment insurance premiums etc. If the dancer then attempts to report significantly higher earnings on her own tax return as coming from a different source besides the 'employee' club, this technically constitutes tax fraud.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
um...wow, you said a mouth full there Melonie. My hat's off to you and your thoroughness in this matter.
My hunch is that you are correct in that clubs will probably limit shifts and maintain part-time employee status for dancers. I think the off shoot of this will be dancers having to work at more than one club if they want to work more than three shifts a week. I am guessing that clubs will try to institute a seniority system as far as who gets preferential shifts...or do whatever they want until someone lodges a complaint.
I do know several day shift girls who make $300 to $500 a shift on average but none of them are going to stay at a mass club if the owner starts going for a 50/50 dance revenue split. There are simply too many options in RI and CT.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
I believe most clubs will be able to manage a schedule that allows the dancer five - 6 hour working shifts and still allows the club to define the dancer as a part time employee. I also don't see RI and CT being immune to the same pressure to change their view of dancer's as employees in the near future. Some clubs aren't big on swing/middle shifts, but this change may encourage those clubs to consider it further as a means to protect itself against the grim business realities expressed so well by Melonie.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
The clubs have no one to blame but themselves. I've been both an employee dancer and an independent contractor and prefer IC. The reasons is that if an IC was attractive and a hustler she could make a lot of money. Of course the good point of being an employee is you get paid no matter what. I have to agree though that once clubs started acting like employers (forcing dancers to work certain times, telling when to take breaks, etc) that dancers are technically employees.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
Kellydancer
Of course the good point of being an employee is you get paid no matter what.
Honestly this cracks me up. The servers wage is around $2.70 an hour. So for a six hour shift the dancer gets paid a whopping $16.20 for her shift. It's not even Walmart money...
I do agree that the clubs have only themselves to blame. I don't know much about the situations outside of Mass clubs but the first lawsuit that was won in Mass was brought by dancers at a club near Boston who where being charged ridiculous house fees and fines at work as well as being treated badly and even left off of the schedule for weeks at a time if they gave management a hard time about anything. It was, and still is, a blue collar club in a blue collar neighborhood and there wasn't much money there to be made in the first place. Funny thing is, if I'm not mistaken I believe the girls that started the suit where long gone from dancing and the offshoot of the settlement was that all employees where required to produce proof of legal residency. Most of them couldn't and had to quit the club.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
yoda57us
Honestly this cracks me up. The servers wage is around $2.70 an hour. So for a six hour shift the dancer gets paid a whopping $16.20 for her shift. It's not even Walmart money...
I do agree that the clubs have only themselves to blame. I don't know much about the situations outside of Mass clubs but the first lawsuit that was won in Mass was brought by dancers at a club near Boston who where being charged ridiculous house fees and fines at work as well as being treated badly and even left off of the schedule for weeks at a time if they gave management a hard time about anything. It was, and still is, a blue collar club in a blue collar neighborhood and there wasn't much money there to be made in the first place. Funny thing is, if I'm not mistaken I believe the girls that started the suit where long gone from dancing and the offshoot of the settlement was that all employees where required to produce proof of legal residency. Most of them couldn't and had to quit the club.
Yes but in a bad night $2.00 hour is still more than owing a club, as I've seen happen (luckily never to me). I'm not saying it's right but some dancers might prefer this to nothing at all.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
Kellydancer
Yes but in a bad night $2.00 hour is still more than owing a club, as I've seen happen (luckily never to me). I'm not saying it's right but some dancers might prefer this to nothing at all.
I understand what you are saying but as long as DJ tip-outs and things like "locker fees" are still in place the possibility of having a negative balance still exists. I've seen it happen too. I've had girls offer half price dances just to try and break even.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
True but if they are making a salary (even if it's low) then there is less possibility of making negative. Like I said I have been paid and done IC and prefer IC, but for other women it's the opposite. Salary in my personal experience seems to work better for girls who are less attractive, and hustle less. I've been a waitress too and sometimes the salary is all I made and that's a different situation because you are always working, whereas dancing you may not be.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
Kellydancer
Salary in my personal experience seems to work better for girls who are less attractive, and hustle less.
These girls should not be dancing...
Call me an eternal optimist but I look forward to the day when women will no longer look at dancing as a job that "anyone" can do. I remember when a dancer actually had to be attractive, have a personalty, and yes, a sales pitch, to earn a living in a strip club.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
yoda57us
These girls should not be dancing...
Call me an eternal optimist but I look forward to the day when women will no longer look at dancing as a job that "anyone" can do. I remember when a dancer actually had to be attractive, have a personalty, and yes, a sales pitch, to earn a living in a strip club.
I do too, but unfortunately clubs don't think that way anymore. I don't feel all women should dance, because there are MANY dancers I've known who shouldn't be dancing. It should only be hot girls but with extras many guys don't even care anymore.
Btw, I know I mentioned this before but I briefly worked in a club where the joke was you had to be obese and over 50 to work at. It was a pathetic club but the only redeeming quality was that they paid. I remember when I started dancing the less desirable clubs would pay decent looking girls to get more. Of course once girls realized they could make a lot more money at a nice club they left.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Salary in my personal experience seems to work better for girls who are less attractive, and hustle less
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The servers wage is around $2.70 an hour. So for a six hour shift the dancer gets paid a whopping $16.20 for her shift. It's not even Walmart money...
As an 'employer', the club has an obligation to insure that tipped minimum wage employees ultimately earn the $7.50-$8.00 an hour ( not sure in Mass ) minimum wage rate on the average. The casinos fulfill this obligation by operating a tip sharing system. 'Employer' clubs may have to do the same i.e. collecting stage tip earnings from all dancers and then redistributing that tip money in 'equal' shares via the club's payroll system in order to assure that no dancer averages less than $7.50 per hour in weekly paycheck earnings.
Obviously, an 'employer' club 'extracting' 50% of every girl's private dance earnings, the club paying every dancer the same basic hourly wage, and maybe the club collecting and redistributing tip earnings in equal shares, all favors 'mediocre' dancers and penalizes 'top shelf' dancers.
On the subject of extras, based on experiences with the NY 'employer' club, the only way still open to 'employee' dancers to earn a significant amount of money without having to 'share' half of their additional earnings with the club ( and other dancers ) was to offer some additional 'service' where club customers were willing to pay the dancer directly plus not talk about it.
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the girls that started the suit where long gone from dancing and the offshoot of the settlement was that all employees where required to produce proof of legal residency
yup every 'employer' is legally required to verify the work status of their 'employees' under the Patriot Act. This means citizenship or green card. This will also be cross-checked by the gov't since the club's payroll system is required to report real names, real addresses, SS#'s or TI#'s etc. to the IRS
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I also don't see RI and CT being immune to the same pressure to change their view of dancer's as employees in the near future
from a purely Machiavellian standpoint, the larger a state's budget deficit is, the higher the state's unemployment rate is, the higher a state's income tax rates are, the higher the state's social welfare benefit costs are ( example Mass care ), the stronger the motivation for the state to reclassify independent contractor workers as 'employees'. The obvious reasons are that 'officially reported' income therefore taxes will increase, insurance premiums will have to be paid by the 'employer' to state unemployment / disability / comp systems, health care related penalties can be assessed on the 'employer' etc., all of which incrementally reduce the state's budget problems.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
Melonie
As an 'employer', the club has an obligation to insure that tipped minimum wage employees ultimately earn the $7.50-$8.00 an hour ( not sure in Mass ) minimum wage rate on the average. The casinos fulfill this obligation by operating a tip sharing system. 'Employer' clubs may have to do the same i.e. collecting stage tip earnings from all dancers and then redistributing that tip money in 'equal' shares via the club's payroll system in order to assure that no dancer averages less than $7.50 per hour in weekly paycheck earnings.
Obviously, an 'employer' club 'extracting' 50% of every girl's private dance earnings, the club paying every dancer the same basic hourly wage, and maybe the club collecting and redistributing tip earnings in equal shares, all favors 'mediocre' dancers and penalizes 'top shelf' dancers.
When I worked at clubs that paid the system set up was they paid us a set amount (it was actually more than minimum wage, it was something like $50) and we kept all our tips on stage but we had to split table dances and in one case we didn't get any of our table dance fees. I ended up quitting because I was making much less than I was at clubs where I tipped out. I never had to share my tip money with other dancers and that would make me mad because I was a hustler.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Originally Posted by
rockie
I also don't see RI and CT being immune to the same pressure to change their view of dancer's as employees in the near future.
Anything can happen of course but the fact of the matter is that the Commonwealth of Mass didn't start this crackdown, it's all a reaction to the private lawsuits and the Mass court's interpretation of state law. To this point, the commonwealth has not shown up on the doorstep of any of these clubs demanding to see any employee records...in other words, they don't care. The clubs are reacting out of fear of further law suits, not from any sort of state crackdown. Can it happen in RI or CT? Sure it can but I'm betting it's not going to happen until a dancer or two decide to initiate a lawsuit. My feeling is that most dancers are still too smart to screw up a system that, though flawed, works for most of them. Also, as the girls dancing in CT and RI start to see girls migrating from Mass clubs they will see for themselves that the grass was not greener after the lawsuit. I don't see changes happening anytime soon.
Local and even federal government have known about the way clubs operate for years. They have chosen to do nothing. Why? I'm guessing it's because with the limited resources they have available they don't feel that chasing clubs and strippers is worth the effort.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
Just a counterpoint to some of the things previously said. Where I'm from we started out making $25 an hour, 1 free meal from the club, and 2 free drinks. $20-25 shift pay was common and the worst shift pay was $18 an hour in the dives. It was all off the books. We kept all of our dance money. There were less girls and you had to not only look good but dance well to get in these clubs. We got 2 or 3 shifts a week and were free to work a few clubs at a time so even though you didn't have one home club you also couldn't be crippled by the actions of one jerkoff holding you off the schedule. THEN things changed when a certain club owner decided not to pay salary anymore and over the next 4 years the rest of the clubowners followed suit.
So there is a profitable system that can work even better. The owners don't have to pay minimum tip wage and they don't have to take a chunk of every transaction. Better quality control does pay off. BTW these clubs were packed with guys even during downturns.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Call me an eternal optimist but I look forward to the day when women will no longer look at dancing as a job that "anyone" can do. I remember when a dancer actually had to be attractive, have a personalty, and yes, a sales pitch, to earn a living in a strip club.
We can only dream, Yoda.
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Re: Clubs in Mass moving towards dancer as "employee"
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Where I'm from we started out making $25 an hour, 1 free meal from the club, and 2 free drinks. $20-25 shift pay was common and the worst shift pay was $18 an hour in the dives. It was all off the books. We kept all of our dance money
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So there is a profitable system that can work even better. The owners don't have to pay minimum tip wage and they don't have to take a chunk of every transaction
good luck with this business plan in the 21st century !