The fifth factor in determining whether a worker is an employee, under the fair labor standards act, is described as:

"The alleged contractor's opportunities for profit and loss."

This factor and subsequent factors are kind of similar, but I'll try to interpret what this means. Several things that Shakers did might apply to this factor.

Most strip clubs spend significant amounts of money advertising their business to the public, in order to attract patrons. This has usually been in my favor during lawsuits, because the club is the one spending time and money to attract the patrons. Clubs have tried to argue that strippers advertise with social media, but since social media is usually free and not always dependable, it hasn't always worked out for the club to say this. Shakers was a lot different though, because as far as I was able to see, they didn't spend money on advertising AT ALL.

While I worked at Shakers, there wasn't always a lot of opportunity for profit. Shakers was often dead and dancers would complain that the club needed to be advertising more. Secretly, I was thinking about how interesting it all was that Shakers didn't make overt efforts to attract clients. Some of the dancers had regulars who had been coming there for a long time, and came in to visit them. Shakers does have a facebook presence, but that was all that I think they do. I don't have enough information about their past advertising attempts to compare. Shakers had a friend-spy to come in and talk to me about advertising, so I think maybe they stopped after the lawsuit. The slowness of the club had everyone at an economic disadvantage, and I legitimately worried how much of a struggle it must have been for the Robinson family to survive like they were off of their club.

Having to go on stage when called and having a piece of paper with dance prices on them were two things that other dancers experienced which affected their opportunities for profit and loss. Since I was treated special and heard special monologues all the time, this factor didn't apply to me according to most lawyers.

Factors six and seven are kind of similar to factor five, so I will describe other things at Shakers in those posts while acknowledging that they can also be applied to this one.