Having personally been through the employee vs contractor maelstrom when, for some unknown reason, the state government got a bug up it's ass, I'd have to say that the state requirements become quite arbitrary.

What you might think is appropriate is sort of besides the point.

I too have been through the maelstrom. What I think is appropriate for me as it all boils down to interpreting the IRS regs and hiring a good lawyer who successfully avoids and navigates lawsuits for me. Just because I navigated it successfully doesn’t mean I’m right or my interpretation is appropriate for all.

But I think it’s pretty useful and certainly disproves that it’s not possible to hire software contractors.

> You can’t set hours and direct particular tasks day to day.

What if this is part of the requirement of doing the contract work?

For example, your job is to pair program with one of their employees and they are only available from 10am to noon.

Technically the person paying you for your time is setting your hours.

This gets into a big grey area and I’m not sure there’s an absolute rule. If I were writing the contract I would say “must pair program with employees” and let the contractor figure iut how to meet the req.