who are being legally classified as independent contractors rather than employees to reduce and/or transfer more of the firm's operating expenses to its labor force.

But the incentives that encourage the retiring owners of small privately-owned (as opposed to publicly-traded) family businesses--who have no successors willing or able to take over and continue the business--to sell the business to its employees might still be useful even in a steady-state economic future.

I think such incentives could also be created to encourage "stakeholder" corporations, i.e. reducing taxes upfront for large absentee-owned businesses (such as most hotels in Hawaii) which agree to gradually transfer ownership to local employees and/or other local stakeholders over a 20-year period (which could also be made conditional upon becoming "triple bottom line" B corporations in the process).