Posted on 01/05/2023 8:12:25 AM PST by SpeedyInTexas
Non-compete clauses are dumb. And mostly fail in the courts when somebody tries to enforce them. I know a lot of companies have stopped bothering with them. If you don’t want your employees jumping to a competitor pay them better.
1. Every non-compete agreement I ever saw was applicable only in cases where an employee left the firm voluntarily -- in which case, unemployment and other government assistance wouldn't be available anyway.
2. If considerations for unemployment benefits give the government a right to meddle in employer-employee agreements, when what's to stop a government from imposing laws or rules that make it illegal for an employer to EVER fire an employee?
Don’t take the job if you don’t like the terms, or, don’t sign a contract if you think it’s unfair.
Much better than killing private contract law, or neo-Maoist rulemaking - especially coming from people calling themselves “conservative.”
You’ve gotten lucky. Sleazy businesses do much nastier stuff with them. One place I was at threw a non-compete into the severance package when laying people off. You could get 4 months severance BUT you had to agree not to work for a competitor for 2 years. Luckily somebody from legal was in the layoff list and he circulated around to make sure everybody knew it was completely unenforcable so people should sign and ignore.
I don’t think the government really should be stepping in, but companies really should stop the nonsense.
Excellent.
Now set *ALL* patents back to the original 7 years, period, no exceptions, exemptions, or exclusions. And gut NDAs to the greatest degree possible for everything other than completely cutting edge research.
Its government interfering with business which seldom works out well in the end
A business can invest in developing a thing, a service, etc for a substantial amount of time and an employee could wait until a project is planned or developed and walk it out to another competitor
I’m not a huge fan of these agreements but have negotiated a number of them and understand why they exist and the vast majority of the very broadly written ones won’t stand up in court, the narrowly written ones that target specifics seldom preclude people from finding another job in their field and usually do stand up in court.
When you accept employment and sign a non-compete you have signed a contract and unless there was a gun to your head you had a choice and could have sought out other employment so this sounds to me like people wanting uncle sam to help them escape their contractual obligations.
More regulatory horse dookey. Why not also do away with the exclusivity right of companies and inventors to their patents for a certain period of time (Article I, Section 8)?
So the courts have already kept non-competes from getting excessive. But regulators gotta justify their existence.
it’s the lack of seeing objectively, I almost guarantee every person against these would scream its unfair and “should be against the law” if their business was damaged or their customers taken by a former employee
most people I know subject to non-compete agreements are substantially higher paid than those who are not.
get rid of unemployment and welfare and solve the problem the right way and that will not matter.
if the employer wants a noncompete and the candidate doesn’t, then they aren’t in agreement so there is no hire. If the candidate then decides to agree and takes the job, he must abide by it or he shouldn’t have taken the job.
That’s right. When I was a contract programmer I had to sign these.
I agree.
Quote: “It’s quite simple. If we lived in a world where everyone was walking around with a Star Trek-style replicator in their pocket”
The replicators didn’t even fit in the pockets in Star Trek.
Which is a completely inconsequential objection.
<>A non compete clause is a violation of your civil rights.<>
Barf to your social justice feelings.
That’s not true. The courts overwhelmingly side with the employer. You know. The guy with the deeper pockets and high priced lawyer.
I fail to see why anyone in the contracting business should be held to a non compete. Essentially those bound by those agreements are unable to work their trade for 18-24 months. It’s basically a “you’re leaving, good luck putting food on your families table.”
It’s typically the little napoleon types that sue because they’re afraid of competition. I say ban the non competes.
In various ways all four of you object to government ‘meddling’ or interfering in the employer-employee non-compete clause.
But you all want the government to help enforce it, don’t you?
“I have had three of my original works stolen and made many other management people ( both public and private ) wealthy.”
About ten years ago I worked over the holidays at a resort over in Jackson Hole for a while. My specialty is cooking breads and pastries. I brought some of my sourdough starter with me and used it to bake my sweet sourdough rolls which were very popular at the resort.
At the end of the season the resort manager tried to lay claim to my starter. That didn’t go anywhere but I can imagine someone else caving in on something like that.
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