The Union of Associations of Self-Employed Workers and Entrepreneurs (UATAE) has called for strengthening the fight against the fraud of false self-employed workers after more than 47,000 people were regularized by the Labor Inspectorate during 2025. The organization considers that the figure shows that this practice continues to be present in the labor market and demands greater means to detect and sanction it.
False self-employment consists of formally using the figure of the self-employed worker to conceal a relationship that, due to its characteristics, should be employment. UATAE warns that this practice allows transferring costs and responsibilities that would correspond to companies to those who work.
The general secretary of UATAE, María José Landaburu, has highlighted the dimension of the regularizations registered during the last year.
"That in a single year more than 47,000 people who appeared as self-employed when in reality they maintained an employment relationship had to be regularized demonstrates that there is still much to be done," says Landaburu.
A fraud that affects all self-employed workers
UATAE maintains that the problem not only harms people who are fraudulently considered self-employed, but also the entire self-employment sector. According to the organization, companies that resort to these practices can reduce costs by avoiding obligations associated with an employment relationship.
"Behind every false self-employed person there is a company that has decided to save on labor obligations by transferring them to the worker; we cannot normalize it or allow it to be profitable," adds Landaburu.
The organization believes that combating this type of fraud also allows protecting the millions of self-employed workers who legally carry out their activity and comply with the corresponding obligations.
UATAE also focuses on the evolution of the labor market and the emergence of new business models. Although delivery platforms have concentrated a good part of the debate on false self-employed workers, the organization warns that the phenomenon can extend to other sectors and activities.
More resources for the Labor Inspectorate
Given this situation, UATAE demands an increase in the human and technical resources of the Labor Inspectorate, in addition to improving the mechanisms aimed at identifying disguised employment relationships.
The organization also advocates for strengthening coordination between the Labor Inspectorate and the General Treasury of Social Security, with the aim of facilitating earlier detection of possible irregularities.
UATAE considers it especially important to adapt these tools to new digital business models, capable of concentrating a high number of labor relations. "We do not accept that the word self-employed is used to conceal labor relations," says Landaburu.
The organization thus demands that the fight against false self-employed workers not be limited to regularizing cases once discovered, but rather allow anticipating new forms of fraud. "Self-employment needs more rights and more protection, but it also needs no one to use our figure as a back door to precarious employment," concludes Landaburu.
For UATAE, the more than 47,000 regularizations in 2025 reflect the need to maintain controls and adapt inspection actions to new forms of labor market organization.
