[Ajedi32]

The law only protects you from actual crimes. There are hundreds of other small provisions which have to be negotiated as part of a contract to be enforceable from a legal perspective.

This is especially true for freelancers, who don't have a single employer and are instead usually paid for deliverables as specified in a contract. Being able to quit anytime doesn't help if you've already spent weeks or months working on a project and never get paid because the company decides on a whim that they don't need your deliverable anymore.