Oregon: Working Partner Was Not a “Subject Worker” Under State Comp Act

Where a husband worked in an enterprise with his wife and shared the profits (or losses) of the business equally with her, the Oregon Workers’ Compensation Board was within its powers to find that he was not a "subject worker" (see Ore. Rev. Stat. §656.027(8), excluding certain partners from the category of "subject worker") and, as a partner, the husband had not applied for or made an election of coverage, as he might have done pursuant to Ore. Rev. Stat. § 656.128(1). The court acknowledged that there was some evidence from which it might be inferred that the two spouses intended to create an employment relationship between the husband and the business, but there was also substantial evidence in support of the board's finding that claimant and Sandra were co-owners of the business and, therefore, partners. The husband was never paid a salary or wages. While the wife secured workers compensation coverage because it was required for one of the firm’s projects, she indicated the firm had one employee, but did not disclose that the husband was that employee. Nor did the insurance application disclose that the husband was a partner seeking coverage.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See In re Compensation of Pilling, 2018 Ore. App. LEXIS 39, 289 Ore. App. 715 (Jan. 4, 2018)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 76.05.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law