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by nbadg 3026 days ago
I'm curious -- how does this work with, for example, a professional Youtuber? Are they considered Youtube employees?
1 comments

This is a great question and a pretty common misconception.

No, because the revenue test is one of the criteria the judge/IRS looks at. There are other criteria like where and how the "contractor" wants the job done and the relationship between the parties.

Youtube does not tell these Youtubers how to present their videos

Youtube does not tell these Youtubers how long their videos should be

Youtube does not tell these Youtubers when they should release the video

Youtube does not tell these Youtubers what target audience they should be making videos for

Youtube does not tell these Youtubers what income they will get per video made regardless of how popular the video is (surge pricing anyone?)

Uber does.

This is a good overview in the US legal landscape, though it's worth pointing out that the IRS and DOL have differing standards on what does or does not constitute and employment relationship. But I'm actually interested in the European legal landscape here, where contracting relationships generally require the contractor to acquire a certain percentage of their revenue from a separate source. If someone was earning their entire living on Youtube, it would seem to me that these EU laws would consider that person an employee of Youtube. That's obviously not something Youtube would appreciate, and I'm not sure if it's actually the case -- hence the question.