The law, which went into effect January 1, is experiencing heavy industry pushback for its broad classifications, prompting lawsuits from across the tech industry and promises from lawmakers to tweak the legislation.

While much of the focus has been on its effect on drivers for ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft and on freelance journalists, the law is having wide-ranging ramifications in many industries. It's even advancing the effort of at least one group of strip club employees trying to unionize dancers in the state.

The gig economy law, known as AB 5, was designed to expand basic legal protections to more than a million workers who had long been considered independent contractors, including the right to health care and the right to earn a minimum wage, and perhaps most notably, the ability to join unions for the first time.