Lorena Gonzalez is a California state assemblymember from San Diego, identified by Bob Zadek as the legislative sponsor of two statutes targeting the gig economy: AB 5, which he says declared war on the gig economy, and the FAST Act. Across five episodes of The Bob Zadek Show, Zadek treats her as the author and symbol of what he calls the most classic case of finding something that’s not broken and then fixing it.
AB 5 and the gig economy
Zadek describes Gonzalez as the chief sponsor of AB 5 in California, a statute he says was basically focused on Lyft and Uber but captured other industries as well. In his account, the statute sought to declare that the status of Uber and Lyft drivers and other industries was not that of independent contractors setting their own hours and working, but rather that of employees who had to be treated as employees, with what he calls profound cost implications and work rule implications. He calls it a declaration of war against the entire gig economy Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
The political cover for the legislation, Zadek says, was Gonzalez’s stated aim of protecting workers from being exploited — a label he calls the most absurd one can imagine. He argues that no compulsion exists in the gig economy: a business model is created, a worker can sign or not, and can work whatever hours they want. He asks how an opportunity that did not exist before can possibly be exploitation Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
Kim Kavin, a guest campaigning against the bill, responds that supporters of the legislation have been led to believe they are helping people who are struggling, and that this is a good impulse. She cites studies from the U.S. Treasury Department, the Internal Revenue Service, ADP Research, Intuit and Gallup, released in the months before COVID hit, in which 70 to 80% of independent contractors routinely say they want to stay independent contractors. She adds that the same studies show independent contractors make as much if not more money than people in similar roles in traditional workplaces, and that a recent Gallup study found them happier working in one field than someone with a traditional job in one field. She concedes that in unskilled, low-paying professions such as janitorial house cleaning there is an opportunity to cause harm, and that government agencies should go after corporations that exploit people that way — but argues the laws as written cannot tell the difference between those workers and people like her Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
Zadek also reports that Gonzalez was inundated with complaints, and that over 30 or 40 amendments worked their way through the system as subgroups sought carve-outs. He says the medical profession and accountants’ profession obtained carve-outs, and that the process left the bill regulating only the people with less political power. In his framing, the legislation itself ends up exploiting the most powerless, and the only evidence of exploitation is in the legislation itself, not in what it is trying to protect against Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
The “not a very good job anyway” exchange
In a later episode, Zadek recalls a hearing Gonzalez conducted when Uber and Lyft drivers complained they were going to lose their jobs. According to Zadek, she shrugged it off by saying, “It’s not a very good job anyway.” He calls this the moment that expressed her arrogance most directly, and objects that she told people who had voluntarily elected to drive for Uber that they did not have a very good job. He describes AB 5 as a huge overreach of legislative power that prohibits, under pain of sanctions, someone from voluntarily accepting employment as an independent contractor from somebody they want to serve at a price they are willing to accept — which he calls the opposite of freedom The Case for Recalling Gavin Newsom (2021).
The FAST Act
Zadek says that flushed with the success of AB 5 — even though it was watered down and affected by California’s Prop 22, which said “Not so fast, folks. We don’t like that statute” — Gonzalez was at it again as chief sponsor of the FAST Act. He says this might tell listeners something about the source Which Side Are You On? (2022).
His objection to the FAST Act is that it fixes something that is not broken. He says the fast food industry in California and nationwide absolutely works: it delivers a product people like at a cost they are willing to pay, provides entry-level jobs more so than most other industries, and pays wages above the minimum wage, mostly around the country, simply because there are not enough workers. He describes customers wanting the food, the restaurants being clean, and workers getting entry-level jobs, and asks why an entire complex system that works beautifully should be rejiggled California Passes the Worst Piece of Legislation Since AB 5 (2023).
Zadek says the legislation has only one purpose: it is a gift to the unions who could not find a way to force workers to join a union by having them vote, and who therefore resorted to the thinly disguised compulsion of a statute — “your money or your life” Which Side Are You On? (2022).
The free-rider argument and union decline
Zadek reports that Gonzalez defended her bill by saying that independent contractors are like free riders because, by not being employees, they are not paying unemployment insurance or Social Security taxes, and therefore are free riders in the country. His answer is that they also do not get unemployment insurance benefits, and that a consenting adult can make a conscious decision to forgo the benefits and forgo the tax Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
He also argues the legislation carries the taint of an attempt to reverse the decline in union membership. He states that union membership has declined profoundly, to about 8 or 9% of the private-sector workforce, down from around 30 or 35% 30 to 40 years earlier, and that unions are fighting to remain relevant and keep a cash flow. In his account the legislation is about the government getting more tax dollars and unions getting more membership, both under the guise of protecting workers Terrible New Worker “Protection” Laws Threaten the Gig Economy (2020).
Across episodes: a consistent charge
The excerpts show no development in the treatment of Gonzalez; the same charges recur across the episodes. In the 2020 episode Zadek calls her the sponsor of AB 5 and attacks the exploitation rationale, with Kavin supplying the survey data against it. In the 2021 recall episode he adds the hearing anecdote and the “not a very good job anyway” remark. In the December 2022 and January 2023 episodes he carries the same framing forward to the FAST Act, repeating nearly identical language about AB 5 as a declaration of war on the gig economy and about the FAST Act as a solution in search of a problem. The later episodes add the union-gift characterization and the fast-food-industry defense; the earlier episode supplies the free-rider exchange and the union-decline figures. Zadek advances every one of these arguments himself; Kavin is the only guest in these excerpts who speaks to the substance of the bills.
What the sources do not cover
The excerpts do not give Gonzalez’s party, the district she represents beyond Zadek’s description of her as from San Diego, or any response of hers to the criticisms beyond the free-rider defense and the hearing remark as Zadek recounts them. They do not state the formal title or number of the FAST Act, the text or holding of any constitutional challenge, or the outcome of the referendum Zadek anticipates. Nothing in the excerpts reports Gonzalez’s own account of the carve-outs, the amendments, or the union relationship attributed to her legislation.