IANAL, but I'm almost positive they don't have to do this in the US.

In the US, hiring contractors exempts you from many of the taxes and liabilities of hiring employees, and they are also exempt from most benefits (their right to litigation against the company is also limited).

US readers will certainly be familiar with Vector (ie, Cutco knives) - they get away without providing any benefits/insurance, without reimbursing for expenses such as gas/phone bills, and with paying what often amounts to minimum wage because all of their salesmen are college students who are hired as 'contractors'[1].

Don't think I'm saying that contracting is bad - the same laws allow others to make very large sums of money working as contractors. It really just depends on what the setup with the company is.

[1] I may be confusing some of the details with other similar companies, but I know Vector engages in at least some of these practices, all of which are commonly practiced.

Thanks for your reply. Talked with some more informed friends about the situation in Sweden and their conclusion is that work like TaskRabbit probably could exist in some kind of grey area (especially when it's one private individual working for another private individual for a small amount). However when the service grows the unions will try everything to make your workers "unionized" implying that either the service company (e.g. TaskRabbit) or the buyer needs to pay insurance and minimum-wage for the work being performed - basically hiring the individual.

I guess this is not interesting for must of you US readers but it could be telling of what could happen to your TaskRabbiters.

legally they operate as entrepreneurs providing services for customers sourced through a website. This exempts them from many of the worker protections.

However, at least in Belgium this kind of micro-entrepreneurship is actively discouraged. Contractors require an accounting-certificate or academic degree in order to setup a company (or sole tradership).

Skipping the basic step of registering as a company can leave you or the customer liable to all sorts of fines, depending if a court thinks the customer or the worker is at fault. The issue is sensitive because it involves manual labour, and there is a huge incentive to utilize black labour as labour costs are very high.

This renders a service like TaskRabbit a legal hazard for customers and workers, but the service itself can operate legally.