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I was in an Uber the other day and got talking to my driver. He was a Sikh. We had quite a conversation about his religion and the importance of it to his everyday life. I’ve never met a Sikh before! He was most interesting. I asked him why he drives Uber. His response was quick. He loves being his own boss. He can make his work fit around his family commitments.

My Sikh driver reminded me of why we at Self-Employed Australia have been doing what we do for almost 20 years. We’ve been defending the right of people to be self-employed. We’ve seen attacks from many directions. The attackers always seem to argue that somehow ‘we’ are being exploited. They can’t seem to contemplate that in self-employment there is economic liberty and freedom! My Sikh driver knows and lives that reality.  More...

Some claim that freelancing, self-employment, whatever you want to call it, is surging in developed economies. For example: More...

ICA Executive Director Ken Phillips spoke at a ‘Liberty’ conference in Sydney over the weekend. With over 350 people in attendance and with more than 70 speakers it was a stimulating, ideas-packed weekend. Not everyone agreed with each other, but all present agreed on the right to speak freely.

Ken talked about how we at ICA have used the Australian Constitution to defend individual liberty, specifically the right of people to be self-employed. You might recall last year our:  More...

Owner-drivers
You’ll recall the mess last year in the attempts to destroy the businesses of owner-drivers in Australia.

However, the Victorian government is now reviewing its owner-driver laws, laws that we say are pretty good as they stand. We don’t think the review is looking to set up price-fixing as happened under the disbanded federal law. But Federal Labor voted to keep the disbanded laws. Who knows what the Victorian Labor government’s agenda might be? We urge owner-drivers to keep a close eye on this. More...

Last week, our Executive Director, Ken Phillips, contemplated some ‘revolutionary’ thoughts around self-employment as part of the summer break ‘think’ process.  

Trump
But those thoughts are minor compared with President-elect Donald Trump’s proposals for self-employed people in the USA. According to Forbes magazine and CBSNews,  Trump is going to open the tax floodgate for the self-employed, allowing them to access the 15 per cent tax rate he intends to apply to companies.  More...

Against a backdrop of 'revolutionary' social and political developments in 2016, ICA Executive Director Ken Phillips has posted a new blog which looks at the prospects for the new world of work in the year ahead. Noting the seemingly unstoppable growth of all forms of self-employment, Ken also examines some of the adverse reactions to self-employment and surveys some recent (and quite diverse) academic discussion about the value of 'being your own boss'. You can read Ken's full blog post here. More...

This month, ICA Executive Director Ken Phillips has an article in Flying Solo explaining why the new unfair contract laws for small business people are so significant. It’s a rather timely article because the ACCC has just released a new guide to the laws.

It’s worth being aware of your rights as a ‘solo’ business person under these new laws. These Australian laws are a global first. It’s these sort of laws that will make the ‘gig’ economy fairer and hence sustainable as a new business model.  More...

The debate never seems to stop about whether being an independent worker is a good or bad thing.

Californian regulators and the Teamsters Union seem intent on forcing ride-sharing workers to be employees. There’s a $12 million lawsuit against Lyft  and Uber is involved in long drawn-out Californian litigation. Further, Californian lawmakers are looking to make it very difficult to work in the ‘gig’ economy.  More...

In a recent news alert we discussed the rise of self-employment in the UK and Canada that is making up most of the new jobs in those countries. We discussed how China is discovering that the self-employed are the ‘happiest’ workers. This is part of the pattern of the ‘gig’ economy: Uber, Airbnb and many others creating a new economy. We call it ‘capitalism of the individual’; self-employment.  

This should be a welcome and exciting progression of human economic development. But, around the world, hugely powerful institutions are in the ‘suppression’ game. These institutions are government-funded and pursue their own agendas in a ‘Yes, Minister’ style of control over the political process. More...

ICA is proud of its efforts over the last seven years arguing for the unfair contract laws for small business people. We’ve said that we’re delighted that the Turnbull government is moving forward with the laws. And we’re thankful to the Senate and to Senators for making sure the laws will have a wide application.  More...