Ruling creates stormy outlook for exotic dancers

“Who doesn’t want health insurance and workers comp coverage?” a guest columnist asks in Tuesday’s Los Angeles Times.

Well, not all exotic dancers do, famed porn actress and President Donald Trump’s alleged mistress Stormy Daniels claimed in a column she penned for the newspaper, arguing that recent case law will threaten this particular line of work.

“At most strip clubs, including the ones I’ve worked at throughout my career as a stripper, dancers work as independent contractors who set their own hours. They show up for work on the days they are able to, allowing them to give priority to things like writing a term paper, studying for a test or putting their children to bed at night,” she wrote.

Her cause for concern is the recent California Supreme Court decision Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles that found in order for a worker to be an “independent contractor,” a worker must perform “work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business.”

“The work strippers do is clearly not outside the usual course of a strip club’s business,” Ms. Daniels wrote.

Ms. Daniels also argued that forcing exotic dancers into employment contracts limits their money-making ability. “Employment status is incompatible with the business model of exotic dancing,” she wrote. “The successful strippers I know are industrious entrepreneurs. We move from club to club, going where the money is best.”