Freelance Busting: The Substack

News and analysis about our right to choose self-employment

Hi. I’m Kim. Welcome to my Substack, where I’ll be writing about the unprecedented attack that’s being waged against the right to choose self-employment all across the country.

My motto, all day and every day, is stop the freelance busting.

I coined the term freelance busting while helping to lead the independent-contractor resistance, which I’ve been doing since 2019.

That’s when some fellow freelance writers and I created the nonpartisan, grassroots group Fight For Freelancers. Our home state of New Jersey was trying to copy California’s disastrous anti-independent-contractor law known as Assembly Bill 5, and we didn’t want to lose our clients and careers the same way independent contractors on the West Coast got crushed.

We helped to kill the New Jersey bill, and we’ve been fighting ever since to stop AB5-style policies from spreading nationwide. So far, we’ve helped to block multiple attempts in Congress. We’re now suing the U.S. Department of Labor to protect everyone’s right to choose self-employment.

For a five-minute summary of the past five years, watch my testimony on Capitol Hill:

What We Need to Win

With this Substack, my goal is to solve the biggest problem that I see in the independent-contractor resistance: Our attackers are much better organized than we are.

There are 14 million of them and, by some estimates, 72 million of us. They should be afraid to come after us in the first place.

Our very nature is the primary weapon they’re using against us.

Independent contractors, by definition, value our independence. We’re the people who quit the 9-to-5 job, hang out a shingle and go into business for ourselves. We work in hundreds of professions as diverse as real-estate agents, owner-operator truckers, graphic designers, wedding planners, translators and financial advisers.

We all need to start thinking of ourselves first and foremost as independent contractors.

The freelance-busting crowd isn’t attacking any single profession. They’re attacking our right to choose self-employment of every kind.

That’s why this Substack exists.

Please, Tell a Friend

People who are divided are easier to conquer.

There are way more of us than there are of them. We need to act like it.

I’m an independent contractor, and I want to remain self-employed. That’s what I’ll be writing about here. Anything that involves freelance busting is fair game for this Substack.

Please, tell a friend:

I’ll see you back here soon.