Shep69, lots of good points. My bottom line is that I don't think the law was originally meant to apply to Cathay's US-based crew, rather crew of Qantas (for example) who fly LHR-JFK-LAX-SYD.
We'll see what happens...
Oh, and the entity is not a d/b/a. It's a foreign corporation registered with the Secretary of State of California. It has to comply with all US laws which apply to its operations and employees in the US. Unfortunately, this exempts it from FICA, FUTA and since the states' disability insurance law is due to a mandate by the federal government, SDI.