White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers • Hacker News Board

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#321

Post by dredmorbius » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

nickff wrote: post #96

dredmorbius wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're raising the spectre of artificially nonfungible conditions, and ignoring power differentials between employers and employees, as well as game theory leading to non-optimal equilibria.

I don't understand what you mean when you say that I am "raising the spectre of artificially nonfungible conditions"; I described a possible situation, and asked whether you agreed that it was possible that non-compete bans could be 'anti-employee' per your definitions. I agree that I am ignoring many things, as this is a limited discussion, and I am only addressing the impact of a law on a single employee, and its e…

First, you're moving goalposts (the initial question was about how or why noncompetes are anti-worker, anti-competitive, and/or anti-innovative), and doing so without acknowledging the point. Chalk it up to my own history of arguing on the intartubes, but I find that tedious and generally a Bad Sign of things to come.

Secondly: my second point answers my first.

Markets don't manifest in individual transactions, they manifest as the emergent behaviour of multiple transactions. As others have noted, setting bounds to what can be traded away has proven necessary, empirically, to avoid winding up in a highly non-optimal equilibrium point.

If you're interested in ethical ramifications, I recommend two excellent works on the topic: A Theory of Moral Sentiments and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.

Even that treatment is unsatisfactory as it neglects considerations of short-term vs. long-term trade-offs.

Your example is contrived in that it essentially poses a Sophie's Choice: give up condition of long-term viability A or because of my superior position in establishing and enforcing terms, give up condition of long-term viability B.

The optimum condition would be for no artificial constraint on A or B imposed by the employer.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#322

Post by HillaryBriss » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:20 PM UTC

nothrabannosir wrote: post #156

tjic wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand why there's so many people in the comments defending non-competes. They have literally no value to society, or to individual employees. To go meta for a moment: I think that this sort of statement exposes a flaw that many of us have in debates. It's related to the "argument from ignorance" fallacy, but is not exactly the same thing. I take it as one of my priors that people at news.yc are intelli…

1) deontological: freedom to contract is always a good thing. It is a human right, and government has no legitimate moral power to remove that right from people. That's not a strong argument either. You could substitute "contract" with anything. I say this as a staunch libertarian. Government restrictions aren't bad because "government", but because restrictions. The free market works best when government restricts t…

yeah. if the government court system is assigned the role of deciding civil disputes in contracts between people or companies, doesn't the government also therefore have some right to shape and define the types of contracts which are allowed?

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#323

Post by MrMullen » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

hammock wrote: post #205

This comes one week after - and in contrast to - Donald Trump promising in his first 100 days in office a five-year ban on White House officials and Congressman from becoming lobbyists, and a lifetime ban on White House lobbyists from lobbying on behalf of foreign governments. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/...

This, yet again, demonstrates that Trump does not understand how the US Government works. The President does not make laws, Congress does. You think the very people who signed up for a job so they can get rich later are really going to pass a law that limits their ability to get rich later?

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#324

Post by TheCoelacanth » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:26 PM UTC

Hondor wrote: post #86

jomamaxx wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comments about NDA's are not quite right. NDA's do not capture a lot of the essential issue. Pragmatically speaking, it's nary impossible to work in some fields, and then move to a competing firm without passing on know how or trade secrets. Even the 'manner of approach' to a problem, while it may not be a trade secret, is basically a core part of the 'true IP' that is developed by a company. Using DWAVE as an e…

That's certainly a problem about salesmen taking their clients and other relationships with them. For small sales-only companies anyway, where the company doesn't provide much infrastructure beyond a desk and a phone. But in those cases, maybe the company really is a bit worthless and it's the salesmen that created the value mostly independently and should be able to keep it. Don't forget that not only do companies l…

Even in the case of salesmen, a non-solicitation agreement takes care of that just as well as a non-compete does.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#325

Post by ScottBurson » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:26 PM UTC

tjic wrote: post #146

tristor wrote: post #139

I don't understand why there's so many people in the comments defending non-competes. They have literally no value to society, or to individual employees. They are a tool of restrictive coercion to stifle an employees freedom of movement in the job market. Trade secrets, IP, secret sauce: covered by NDA and IP assignment agreements Client lists, contract terms, sales strategies, reported metrics, financials: covered…

> I don't understand why there's so many people in the comments defending non-competes. They have literally no value to society, or to individual employees. To go meta for a moment: I think that this sort of statement exposes a flaw that many of us have in debates. It's related to the "argument from ignorance" fallacy, but is not exactly the same thing. I take it as one of my priors that people at news.yc are intelli…

Against all that is the fact that California -- which, if it were a separate country, would be the world's seventh largest economy -- does just fine without non-competes. Compare the vibrancy of Silicon Valley with that of the Boston area, for example, which has a much older tradition as an intellectual center and is even better supplied with top universities; but Boston's tech economy has been dominated by large, old firms, without the vitality of innovation we have in the Valley.

You may not be an idiot, but you do seem to be ignorant of the empirical evidence. Non-competes choke off innovation. It's that simple, and that well established.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#326

Post by TheCoelacanth » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:27 PM UTC

Sacho wrote: post #102

Gibbon1 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I look at a job is you get paid three ways. 1. Money. 2. Skills and Knowledge. 3. Career Contacts. With non-competes a company is trying to screw you out of #2 and 3.

As a counterpoint, it allows companies to give you a higher salary in exchange for #2 and 3. Or alternatively, if non-competes are the norm, it would allow a business to provide lower salaries for the incentive of no non-compete clause. The argument whether to ban non-competes should be rooted in the practical applications of the clause. Highly skilled, in-demand workers have the power and financial safety to negotia…

Or the non-compete allows them to keep your salary lower because you have fewer options of places to work.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#327

Post by MrMullen » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:29 PM UTC

Steeeve wrote: post #113

I've heard of two or three people in my lifetime that had a company try to enforce a non-compete. Two were during a Microsoft/Google fight, and one was in the late 60s with a scientist. Has anybody around here been sued after leaving a company due to a non-compete clause?

I have a good story on non-compete agreement!

I worked for a company based in New Mexico while I lived in California. When we both got sick of each other, at the exit interview the HR personnel on the phone from New Mexico told me I could not work in IT for the next 2 years as I signed a non-compete agreement. I just started laughing at them and told them I lived in California and good luck with enforcing that contract. End of conversation and I was out in the parking lot 5 minutes later, still laughing.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#328

Post by falcolas » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:31 PM UTC

drakonandor wrote: post #315

falcolas wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand why there's so many people in the comments defending non-competes. There are many "temporarily embarrassed" entrepreneurs that read HN who can't stomach the thought of their future tech lead stealing their idea. I personally worked for one such person, whose startup was so new that employees were being paid only with shares, but still had about 10 pages of legal documentation for new employees to…

The 'temporarily embarrassed' phrase is a trope used to belittle those who aren't sore losers about other people being more successful than them.

Not at all. I used the phrase as a riff on "Temporarily Embarrassed Millionaires": people who make judgement calls based not on their current societal class but on their expected class, since they expect to soon join that other class.

I feel it's an adequate explanation of why people who are currently employees who support such employee-hostile policies.

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#329

Post by briffle » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:38 PM UTC

losteverything wrote: post #274

Tragic story of a business. You decide if it was stolen. Happened a few years ago to a client friend. Husband wife owns a florist. Has for decades in a county fourth highes per capita income in us. Built a nice life but it was time to retire and sell the business. They did not own their building. New landlord buys building ( shop in nice main street area.) raises rent to outrageous amount. Too much to run the busines…

I'm a bit confused on how this is relevant? would a employee signing a non-compete agreement have prevented this? Even if there was one with the previous lanlord, would that have applied in the case of a sale?

Re: White House urges ban on non-compete agreements for many workers

#330

Post by st3v3r » Wed, Oct 26, 2016, 4:38 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #243

imglorp wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As most readers here would agree, ideas are worth almost nothing but executing on them is the value.

> As most readers here would agree And yet we are still confronted with NDAs just to listen to "Facebook for Farmers" pitches. Perhaps it's better to say those entrepreneurs are afraid of their implementers leaving with all of the domain specific knowledge; believing that it would allow them re-create the product and outmaneuver the entrepreneur. Of course it's never really that easy, but so few fears are rational.

Well, if it's the typical person who does pitch "Facebook for Farmers", I'd say the fear is kinda rational, as those people never intend to do any of the work. They just had the idea, and now you need to go make it happen.