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Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
The strippers of Oregon are going to have to answer this very question next year, and I was wondering what the ladies of StripperWeb think of either option. I've done both, and they both have their advantages and drawbacks.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
I wouldn't want to vote without knowing exactly what being an employee would change for you. I was an employee making minimum wage for five years and was also allowed to keep all my tips and $20/$25 per dance. It was a great setup as long as you wanted to work part time, because they weren't quite so generous as to give out benefits.
Would they pay a higher than minimum wage but give you a tiny "commission?" Would you be allowed to work full time and receive benefits? And any number of details I don't know to ask.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
it would depend on how things were set up, being an employee at one club could be completely different than being one at a different club and same with IC. what i would prefer would to be an IC with the set up i have in my club now ( only being treated like an actual IC..a girl can dream right?)
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
spearmint Rhino in my state has an option for the ladies to choose - if they choose independent they get a 20 page contract - lol - probably more like 10 pages but still a lot - my stripper friends all take that option
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Oh, forgot that I was actually an employee at Flashdancers in NYC briefly, where you could choose whether to be an off the books IC or an employee. They were the worst at treating IC's like employees, but the benefit was that they could choose to declare whatever taxes they wanted to, if at all. I wanted to have income on the books though, and employee status significantly lowered my taxes on all "wages" paid by the club (private rooms). Would clubs in Oregon offer a tax break with an employee model? Would it all vary from club to club?
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
^^ I had a club that offered me either IC or employee... but they paid the employees $7.35/hour and you had to turn all your money over to the house.
I wonder why they even presented that option; it was so shitty that who the hell would take it? Unless they maybe got sued at one point...
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Employee status defeats the purpose for me. I'll keep paying house fees and tip out so that I can be my own boss, make my own hours, talk to whomever I want to, and get paid in cash, thanks.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
^^Sadly, it doesn't always work like that as all too many of us know from working in clubs that act like they own IC's anyway!
Sometimes clubs that offer both options treat employees better. The Flash chain I mentioned treats IC's exactly like their employees, except that they paid a nice chunk of employee taxes. If you wanted to remain an IC and not live totally off the books, it was something like a static 33% in anything declared income vs "normal" graduated income tax brackets on reported payouts, which usually aren't going to be as bad as the former unless you're making SERIOUS dough. Meaning everyone got mandatory schedules, house fees, equal fines, appearance requirements, etc, but "responsible taxpayers" are greatly benefitted. I could only see dancers who didn't have citizenship, or wanted to keep an extremely low spending profile/risk audit otherwise choosing to remain IC's.
On the other hand, if the absurd "employee" model Selina cites were to go in effect at Oregon clubs, it would obviously benefit only those who were literally ineligible for any other obvious forms of employment and weren't aware of cam sites. Or unambitious women who want to get paid $7.35 to put no effort into a job whatsoever and get free drinks. Lol.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
Hustler in Baltimore offered the employee/IC choice. Like Selina said, the employee option was such a piss-poor setup for dancers I wondered why they bothered to offer it. I think they gave a small wage (don't remember what the exact wage was) & you could keep 25% of tips -- everything else went to the club. They also capped your hrs at approx. 30/wk & afaik, no benefits of any kind. The mgr I talked to claimed he was trying to get a more dancer-friendly employee setup worked out but 'didn't know when that would come into effect' :eyeroll:
Of course all the dancers took the IC option …
But I have to agree w/ others saying that employee status may vary from club to club, just like everything else in this business. I understand that Oregon is doing their own thing -- but I think it would be a good thing if employee/IC conditions were standardised.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
I really appreciate the input. I guard my IC status and prefer it, but I wanted to see what SWers thought about the employee option. The dancers here don't make a ton in tips as it is, $200 a shift is considered normal.
There is a big problem with sex trafficking in this state, do our state lawmakers are going to try to pass some legislation to help identify child sex trafficking. At the very least, I think we are going to be licensed. In a very unusual move, a state representative is forming a panel of exotic dancers to help draft the proposed legislation. I think it is wonderful that my state is actually asking dancers what they want instead of just the club owners or not asking at all and just passing a law w/o any industry consultation.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
No club wants to offer employee status unless it significantly benefits them. Like, if the amount of taxes paid for the dancer plus her wage, is dwarfed by the amount of money she pulls from dances/tips and gives to the house... But if I were in the employee setup, I'd be like "Fuck that! I'm only gonna do 1 dance an hour" and the club would get jack shit from me AND be out my wage/taxes.
That's probably why it's such a shitty setup, they WANT us to stay ICs and hand over our house fees/percentages and avoid all the bs that comes with having employees.
Oregon seems very progressive in the sex worker area. Slightly jealous. Here they can still write tickets for taking tips in your garter... Smh.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
I love being an employee as long as I'm getting paid a livable basepay--like the setup in Guam, for example. If a club is going to expect me to abide by all of the terms that come with being a salaried employee, they'd better pay me more than 2.75 an hour (which is what they pay here).
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
I've done both and to be honest made much more with being an IC than en employee. The best way to sum it up, if you are a good hustler or the club is busy with lots of employees you'll make more as an IC. If you are lazy, not very attractive (or have a small niche of customers)or the club is not busy being an employee is best. The good thing about being an employee is you got paid more than minimum wage but you had to hustle drinks and you gave the club 50% of your dance money. Being an IC I generally just paid house plus tips to certain employees but of course many clubs treat IC like employees so in those cases it would make more sense to be an employee.
For me it would really depend. If in both cases they told me my schedule and had to give them my dance money I'd probably choose employee. If I just paid house and tipouts I'd probably choose IC.
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^ spot on!
I'm about as lazy as they come which is probably why I loved being an employee so much, lmao.
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I've been to two clubs recently that offered the option and I have no idea why anyone would ever want to be an employee. You got paid 7.25/hr, had to give 25% of all your tips to be shared among the club staff, do promotions for club at the 7.25/hr, stricter scheduling, outfit rules/whatever. I could see it being more of an option if you got any kind of real benefits like a 401K or insurance but none of that. Baffling.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
my club also offers employee status, but none of the girl who signed up have gotten any paystubs or checks, and they haven't even given them their w2s. the poor girls STILL haven't been able to do their taxes for 2013!! but other than the checks that you supposedly get..someday..everything is the same. strict schedules, dress code, fines, house fees, mandatory stage sets. idk what the purpose of offering it is.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
There are pros and cons to both for me. My favorite club had all the dancers as employees and I actually really liked it. Like someone said previously I can be lazy and I find excuses not to go to work.. having set days to work forced me to go in every weekend. I also wasn't irritated when it was slow because I knew I was getting paid just to sit there anyway. That club took 50% of the dances but they were nude and $60/song and I still made the most I've ever made at any other club and it didn't even get crazy busy (just attracted customers with money). But where I'm at now it's nice to be able to show up whenever I feel like even if I disappear for weeks because I have other things going on (work & vanilla job). It probably all boils down to how hardworking you are. If you have no trouble making yourself work a regular schedule and work hard your whole shift then being an independent contractor is better. But I'll admit I'm a lazy stripper! lol.
Oh and just wanted to add that I liked that I had pay stubs to show and an old name the club used to be while I was apartment hunting. Although I'm sure there are alternatives being an IC.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
Employee would be the better one depending on how it's set up. If it's something like this: minimum wage+commission (eg. 70% dancer 30% club)+tips and marginal benefits, it's good.
However, if the club gets to keep all the money and only paying something like 8 bucks an hour? No.
Independent contractor is not a horrible set-up, but it gets so abused that it's not worth it anymore. In southeast Virginia there's a chain of clubs that micromanage the dancers as if they were employees (the can't work more than three hours a day, they HAVE to wear long skirts or dresses, they can't choose their schedules, etc) yet they have the balls to call them "independent contractors". Those clubs were so bad with how they abused the label "independent contractors", that on the dayshift dancers had to also double as waitresses. The worst? Those clubs like to pretend they're all "Vegas-like", but they were pretty dive-y. The name? Headlights.
For me (if I was dancing again), the ideal set-up would be the first one I mentioned.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
Employees make someone else rich.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
I jist think that as strippers, clubs should pay us more than minimum wage--especially if they are taking a steep house cut. It seems like a majority of clubs want to pay us as minimally as possible which is bullcrap, imo.
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Re: Would you rather be an employee or an Independant Contractor?
^^^ to put this in perspective, please consider what 'employee' status could mean in 2015 ...
- 'employers' will face a mandate of providing ACA 'compliant' health care coverage for 'full time' employees, of face a $3-4,000 IRS 'fee' per employee if the employer does not offer health care coverage and the employee purchases ACA 'compliant' health care coverage from a public health exchange instead.
- With the ACA defining 'full time' as 30 hours per week, the almost certain reaction by 'employers' will be to strictly limit 'employees' to part-time status ( i.e. max 3 x 9 hour shifts per week ) to avoid the new health insurance costs or new employer IRS 'penalty'
- in most circumstances, 'full time' employees must be provided with state unemployment and worker's comp insurance at the employer's expense. Thus more motivation for employers to limit max employee working hours per week to <30 thus 'part time' status. A consequence will undoubtedly be strict shift scheduling ... x hours per shift, with particular shifts on particular days / nights scheduled well in advance.
- 'employee' status typically includes DOL supported provisions such as 'seniority rights' ... which, in combination with a <30 hour per week limit to maintain 'part time' employee status, could translate into 'new' dancers being relegated to days or weeknights, while long time dancers are allowed to schedule the more lucrative weekend nights.
- in all circumstances, employers must collect estimated taxes out of dancer's paychecks, maintain a DOL / IRS compliant payroll system, and make necessary reports and estimated tax payments to the IRS and state tax agencies. This involves significant new accounting and payroll processing costs.
- as an employee, dancers give up 'ownership' of private dance and VIP/CR 'services' to their employer. This gives the employers the right to keep any or all customer moneys spent on private dances and VIP/CR. While keeping 100% of customer private dance or VIP/CR money would be a hard sell, clubowners could very well keep 50%, while paying out the remaining 50% to employee dancers as 'sales commissions' via the club's payroll system.
- with no extra customer dollars coming in the front door, but with more dollars going out the club's back door for any of the above reasons, 'employee' status for dancers MUST result in fewer remaining dollars for both the club and for the 'employee' dancers.
- 'employee' status prevents employer clubs from charging house / stage fees, fines etc. This further reduces club revenues at the same time that the club's employee dancer related expenses increase the club's 'costs of doing business'.
- as an employer with full control regarding the payment of commission percentages to 'employee' dancers for their private dance and VIP/CR services, it is highly probable that ALL of the new employee dancer related club expenses will be taken out of employee dancer commission payout percentages ... which effectively allows the club's net earnings to remain neutral in light of the additional employee dancer related club expenses.
- when employee dancers are faced with a 'fixed' tipped minimum hourly wage hourly payout ( which is typically in the $3-4-5 per hour ballpark - varies by state ) regardless of a particular dancer's private dance and VIP/CR sales rate, a situation is created where 'marginal' dancers wind up being 'subsidized' by higher earning dancers. If the club decides to finance the new employee dancer related costs by, say, reducing private dance sales commission payouts to 50% of what the customer is charged, 'marginal' dancers selling 2-3 private dances may wind up contributing just $20-30 in 50% club revenues ( while collecting back $24-32-40 in minimum wages ), while higher earning dancers selling 20-30 private dances may wind up contributing $200-300 in 50% club revenues ( while collecting the same $24-32-40 in minimum wages ). This creates an incentive which will tend to attract 'marginal' dancers to the club, while encouraging higher earning dancers to seek out different clubs where they are allowed to keep a higher percentage of their private dance and VIP/CR sales dollars.
- with percentage payouts for private dance and VIP/CR sales, as well as tip money, being required to flow through the club's 'employer' payroll system ( with full reporting to the IRS and state tax agency ), there will only be one remaining source of 'undocumented income' for the employee dancers. That 'undocumented income' source is payments directly received from club customers in exchange for 'extras' provided during private dances or VIP/CR visits. Thus a strong incentive will arguably be created for employee dancers to offer 'extras' ... since 'extras' money is the only remaining money which they aren't forced to share with the club and the IRS.
- the possible exodus of higher earning dancers, in combination with the possibility of increased availability of 'extras', is likely to fundamentally change the 'personality' of the club ... as well as the club's future customers.