This does sound like it would affect "try before you buy", unless the contractor has significant other work.

Does anyone actually do "try before you buy" in California? It doesn't work in a hot job market, and the job market is currently hot.

> Does anyone actually do "try before you buy" in California?

Yes. It's called C2H - Contract to Hire.

Over 2,000 Tech Jobs in CA that are C2H on Dice.com https://www.dice.com/jobs/advancedResult.html?for_one=&for_a...

Just because there are openings doesn't mean it is frequently done!

I had several places ask me if I'd do contract to hire.

I said then yes, I'll do it for a set period of time at $250/hr, and it can't be canceled by either party until fruition.

To my surprise, they didn't like that offer. Contract to hire is a fucking joke.

Any candidate with a real job offer and a contract-to-hire offer is likely to prefer the real job offer.

I'm currently working as a contract to hire in SF

Do you think you know why the position was structured like that? And did you have other non-contract job offers? Not trying to put you on the spot, just wondering about the details.

I don't know that I have ever used contract for hire in the definition of California, but it is the preferred way to do. If I have an opening for direct hire I get to read some resumes, check your references, have an interview and hope that tells me how well you will write code. Of course how well somebody interviews tells me nothing about how they code, and references are chosen and coached so they are not reliable.

The alternative is hire somebody for a few weeks of contract, and if they are good give them an offer. Note that I specified two weeks. One of my past bosses said he knew faster than the new guys co-workers: when he asked the rest of the team how the new guy was doing, if the guy was good on the 3rd day you could see the mental shift as the team realized the guy hadn't been on the team for years (even though he was asking the teammate who had come to ask when the new guy's computer would arrive). If the guy wasn't good there would be several weeks of he is "getting up to speed".

Most people are hired under terms of "at will employment" anyway.

I doubt it'll affect agencies, since generally there's not a contract with the person but with the agency. No idea about the first case, this is definitely going to result in a lot of billable time for lawyers.

I am going to assume agencies will be the biggest benefactor here. Would be interesting to see if companies like uber/lyft don't spin off agency type setups to isolate the company from the service providers.

This is how my wife joined her current (mega corp) employer with whom she's been with for years.

In her case she was on an educational visa (with employment rights ) at the time of the contract to hire.

She had sought employment for months after completing her degree so was really not in the best position to negotiate.

Similar store with me, except I was 4 months into a layoff when I took a 6 month contract-to-hire position. They made me permanent after about 3 weeks (it is amazing how easy it is to impress an employer when you've had a 4 month forced vacation), and been there 8 years. Never would have applied if I had been working full time somewhere else though.

An agency would be a "corp to corp" contract, so that should not be affected by this ruling, provided the person is an employee of the contracting corp.