Add your vote in assist of the launch of Freelance Is not Free in Los Angeles and share your grievances with buyer non-payment forward of the June 28 Metropolis Council Committee listening to. 3:30 p.m. PT.
Since 1995, the mission of the Freelancers Union has been to construct one thing higher collectively. We attempt to design and implement options to our members’ greatest drawback – and that is at the moment non-payment, with 74% of freelancers reporting they battle with getting paid late or not getting paid in any respect.
The Freelancers Union campaigned victoriously to go the first-of-its-kind Freelance Is’t Free laws in New York Metropolis, giving freelancers unprecedented protections in opposition to non-payment, and we rolled it out nationwide in June. Our battle will not cease with NY and we’re working tirelessly to convey it to different cities and states beginning with Los Angeles.
Los Angeles is thought for its iconic leisure, arts and tradition industries. What’s much less well-known, nevertheless, is the position freelancers play in empowering these sectors and driving development. Actually, Los Angeles is house to the second largest variety of freelancers in the USA, bringing in $20 billion in income yearly.
However this body of workers has not been afforded satisfactory safety for too lengthy. It usually takes weeks to months to pay a invoice — if any cost comes in any respect — and freelancers have nearly no recourse after they stumble. In a metropolis based on inventive folks, this shouldn’t be the case.
That is why we labored with LA Metropolis Councilman Bob Blumenfield to draft and enact laws to create a citywide Freelance Is’t Free Act. Subsequent Tuesday, June 28 at 3:30 p.m. PT, the LA Metropolis Council Committee will maintain a listening to on the Zoom invoice.
A very powerful instrument now we have is our voice. Council members want to listen to from freelancers who’ve suffered unhealthy money owed to know the scope of the issue. It is time to talk! Discover your council member right here and click on right here for a pattern script (each in writing and over the cellphone) to share together with your council member.
In case you are inquisitive about working immediately with us to make this regulation a actuality, both by offering an affidavit or by serving to set up your fellow freelancers, please contact advocacy@freelancersunion.org immediately.
The Freelancer Is Not Free Act creates and enhances the protections for freelancers, particularly the suitable to a written contract, well timed and full cost, and safety from retaliation. The regulation gives penalties for violations of those rights, together with statutory damages, double damages, injunctive reduction, and attorneys’ charges and prices.