Independent truckers Wednesday shut down the terminals at the Port of Oakland in California to protest the impacts of a terrible labor law that may require them to become employees of trucking companies—regardless of whether they want these jobs.
An estimated 70,000 people who own and drive their own trucks in California may soon feel the effects of A.B. 5, a law passed in 2019 that controls and severely restricts who can work as independent contractors within the state. The initial bill came as a response to a 2018 California Supreme Court decision about truck drivers that established a strict test to determine whether a worker should be treated as a company employee or an independent contractor.
