The Czech state long ago made the practice of hiring de facto employees but paying them as if they were doing contract work — dubbed “the Švarc system”— illegal, but tens of thousands of companies and “self-employed” contractors continued to rob the state of tax revenue in this manner with little fear of reprisal. That was all meant to change in January, when parliament approved a revised Labor Code with far higher fines, but now legislators themselves appear to be major offenders.