Cautiously, all hands went up at the debate organized by Existenz 13/02. When Steven Lannoo proposed an intermediate solution regarding the bill on false self-employment in our sector:
💡 Start with one clear rule: Are you an intern architect? Then you are NOT self-employed, but an employee. 💡
The current, legally binding law sets out four criteria to determine whether someone is falsely self-employed:
👉 The free choice of employment status
👉 The free organization of working hours
👉 The free organization of work
👉 The absence of hierarchical control
Maybe there are indeed experienced architectural workers who are rightfully employed as self-employed today? It is likely the 20% who indicated on Dear Architects' salary barometer that they do not consider themselves falsely self-employed.
But how do these criteria align with the position of the intern architect? How can we organize work under this status in the best way to guide someone fresh out of school?
Personally, I found it a particularly constructive proposal. It covers many aspects to continue tackling systemic change tomorrow:
👍 Firms get an easy introduction to the employee status
👍 The "race to the bottom" finally gets a real bottom, which is currently missing
👍 Architectural workers receive support during the first two years of their careers and can focus on learning a complex job instead of losing sleep over VAT returns and tax letters
👍 Hiring someone under the Guaranteed Minimum Monthly Income costs about €22 per hour, cost to company. The firms that would struggle because of this are the ones that have made working with underpaid interns their business model.
😬 How much longer must an entire sector suffer under the preservation of such systems? 😬
Hello, what are we waiting for?