[supportlocal4h]

If you require certain safety or other guarantees from employers, but allow someone to arbitrarily just say, "but I'm not an employer", what have you accomplished? They are absolutely connected.

But this specific issue is whether you can avoid micro management legalization by providing a social safety net. I don't dismiss the idea out of hand, but I do have some questions. It's the perfect topic to explore via a civilized debate.

Edit: added motive of exploration

[cortesoft]

This would probably be something that would have to be determined after actually trying it out. If we have a good social safety net, are there still a lot of people working in dangerous jobs? Is there still a pattern of exploitative behavior from employers?

I would also argue that our safety regulations should not be tied to whether a person is an employee or a contractor. Safety rules should be the same regardless.

I do think some regulation will still be needed, even if everyone had enough that they didn't have to work to survive. It is simply too easy for an employer to hide the danger from their employees; without regulations and inspections, it is likely that a lot of employees wouldn't even realize the danger until something bad happened.