Opinion ID: 2960065
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Law Governing the Employment Status Inquiry

Text: Title VII, by its terms, applies only to “employees,” 42 U.S.C. § 2000e(f), but the statute defines an employee circularly as “an individual employed by an employer.” Id. In Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company v. Darden, 503 U.S. 318 (1992), the Supreme Court ruled that the definitions of “employee,” “employer,” and “employment” are to be determined under the common law of agency, rather than individual state law, whenever statutes failed to specifically define “employee.” Id. at 323. While Darden addressed employment in the ERISA context, courts have adopted its reasoning to apply the common-law agency test to Title VII and other employment discrimination statutes. See O’Connor v. Davis, 126 F.3d 112, 115 (2d Cir. 1997) (Title VII); see also Scott v. Massachusetts Mut. Life Ins. Co., 86 N.Y.2d 429, 433-34 (1995) (NYHRL) (looking to the control test, among other factors, to determine the nature of the employment relationship). Once a plaintiff is found to be an independent contractor and not an employee — whether on summary judgment or after a trial — the Title VII claim must fail. Whether a hired person is an employee under the common law of agency depends on a fact-specific analysis of thirteen factors articulated by the Supreme Court in Community for Creative Non-Violence v. Reid, 490 U.S. 730 (1989), a case dealing with the ownership of a 9 We typically treat Title VII and NYHRL discrimination claims as analytically identical, applying the same standard of proof to both claims. See Mandell v. County of Suffolk, 316 F.3d 368, 377 (2d Cir. 2003); Torres v. Pisano, 116 F.3d 625, 629 n.1 (2d Cir. 1997). The two will be considered together and referred to simply as “Title VII” in this decision. -13- copyright arising from artwork done “for hire.”10 The “Reid factors,” as they are called, are as follows: [1] the hiring party’s right to control the manner and means by which the product is accomplished[;] . . . . [2] the skill required; [3] the source of the instrumentalities and tools; [4] the location of the work; [5] the duration of the relationship between the parties; [6] whether the hiring party has the right to assign additional projects to the hired party; [7] the extent of the hired party’s discretion over when and how long to work; [8] the method of payment; [9] the hired party’s role in hiring and paying assistants; [10] whether the work is part of the regular business of the hiring party; [11] whether the hiring party is in business; [12] the provision of employee benefits; [13] and the tax treatment of the hired party. Id. at 751-52 (footnotes omitted). Reid’s list is non-exhaustive. “Other relevant factors may also be considered so long as they are drawn from the common law of agency that Reid seeks to synthesize.” Eisenberg v. Advance Relocation & Storage, Inc., 237 F.3d 111, 114 n.1 (2d Cir. 2000) (citation omitted). As to the listed factors, the court must weigh only those “that are actually indicative of agency in the particular circumstances,” Langman Fabrics v. Graff Californiawear, Inc., 160 F.3d 106, 111 (2d Cir. 1998), disregarding those that are either irrelevant or of indeterminate weight. See Eisenberg, 237 F.3d at 114. In addition, the test “was not intended to be applied in a mechanistic fashion.” Aymes v. Bonelli, 980 F.2d 857, 862 (2d Cir. 1992). In the context of anti- 10 Prior to reaching the Reid analysis, our precedent suggests we must find that a plaintiff has received some form of remuneration in exchange for his or her work sufficient to establish that he or she is a “hired party.” See United States v. City of New York, 359 F.3d 83, 92 (2d Cir. 2004). We need not address the issue of whether the privilege of using hospital equipment, staff, and space and the mutually beneficial referral practice between OLV and staff physicians — both of which provide an indispensable financial benefit to Salamon’s GI practice — constitute indirect “remuneration” because defendants treat the issue as part of, and urge us to reach, the Reid analysis. -14- discrimination cases, courts should “place special weight on the extent to which the hiring party controls the ‘manner and means’ by which the worker completes her assigned tasks.” Eisenberg, 237 F.3d at 117.