In the past few months, I’ve received a number of emails from clients’ employees using their personal email addresses. As business attorneys, the vast majority of our clients are business entities; our clients often indicate a person or a number of people who will communicate with me and our attorneys when the client seeks legal …
Jacqueline Radebaugh
Cooperatives: the fulfilment of big tech’s empty promises
I often wonder if DAOs are really different from Big Tech. I believe they can be, but that must be an intentional choice. I hope to tell you how DAOs can be different from Big Tech. Big Tech companies have revolutionized the way we live our lives, from the way we communicate with each other …
PATHWAYS TO PURPOSE DRIVEN LEGAL PRACTICE – JACQUELINE’S JOURNEY
Like many of my colleagues in transactional practice who focus on the social enterprise spectrum, the path to my current role was not a straight line. It has however been very true to what I believe in: integrity, justice and fairness, and service to others. I hope this personal post gives you some insight on …
What is the legal treatment of payments to DAO contributors?
If you have been active on Twitter this past year, you probably came across a reference to DAOs and maybe you saw statistics about developers and other folks quitting their jobs to become full-time web3 and DAO contributors. In my work, I have received many questions about DAOs’ legal status and distributions of tokens, and …
Revised Ohio LLC Act – Important changes coming up
Last year, Ohio revised its Revised Code (“ORC”) to update many provisions concerning the Limited Liability Company Act (the “Act”). The Act replaces the Chapter 1705 of the ORC with Chapter 1706. The new provisions will apply to both new and old LLCs and it will govern domestic and foreign LLCs formed before and after …
DAO meets cooperative: Mensiversary of the Wyoming DAO law
In the next few weeks, my colleague Yev Muchnik and I will be posting some of our thoughts on legal aspects of DAOs. Yev has been in the blockchain world for a long time and is a renowned expert in the subject. Providing legal support to cooperatives and social enterprises adopting democratic governance is a …
The Department of Labor “new” final rule for gig workers
On May 5th, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) announced the withdrawal of the “Independent Contractor Rule” which had been adopted by the Trump administration. The rule was expected to be effective on March 8, 2021, but a presidential memo, dated January 20, 2021, has postponed it for two weeks and is expected to open …
How patronage is really paid out to cooperative members: qualified and nonqualified written notice of allocations (2/2)
Patronage dividends represent a unique opportunity for cooperatives to avoid taxation on some of the cooperative’s earnings.[1] Early this month I highlighted the concept of patronage dividends. Generally, when members receive taxable distributions of earnings from a cooperative, such as patronage dividends, they are included in the patrons’ gross income along with other income the …
How patronage is really paid out to cooperative members: qualified and nonqualified written notice of allocations (1/2)
Recently, I had a few clients asking about the distinction between qualified and nonqualified written notice of allocation. Tax season being right around the corner, it feels like a good opportunity to talk about those. The USDA has some wonderful material[1] explaining the definition and use of both notices of allocation, this post and the …
Thoughts from a new economies’ attorney: distinguishing cooperative governing structure
In my previous posts, I discuss how traditional businesses and cooperatives diverge from a capital (and return on capital) point-of-view. Another common misconception is that cooperatives function like nonprofits, typically from the perspective of governance structure. They don’t. Cooperatives are businesses, and, as such, business principles and governance, and business governing structure apply to them. …
