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Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

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Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#41

Post by harry8 »

twblalock wrote: post #7
harry8 wrote: post #6

noncompetes work even when illegal and unenforceable. Why, because you or many of your potential employers don't want the massive cost and emotional toll of being sued - even if you win you lose. That's all google, facebook, microsoft, etc. you know the companies that we KNOW are guilty of operating a cartel to drive down wages. That's all they need. This baseless illegal, legally unenforcable contract provision mean…

> Cue the apologists working for the big silicon valley players... Why? Silicon Valley is in California where noncompetes are illegal. Silicon Valley companies don't use them. I've been in Silicon Valley my entire career and I have never seen one or heard of anyone who has.

"Why? Silicon Valley is in California where noncompetes are illegal"

Everything that follows this is a subsequent edit.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#42

Post by _m96l »

tranchms wrote: post #2

I’ve found these non-competes often have no teeth. Unless you possess exceptional knowledge or secrets, companies will not waste the resources going after you. And often when they do, they lose. But it’s a judgement call. I’d say the fear of non-competes has more power than the non-competes themselves.

> I’ve found these non-competes often have no teeth. Unless you possess exceptional knowledge or secrets, companies will not waste the resources going after you.

You naively conflate "not biting" with "having no teeth".

Amazon forces all workers to sign non-competes. They only sue those who piss them off. Granted, a small minority. But that minority suffers a harrowing ordeal, typically losing their new job and their ability to work.

You better believe the rest are kept in line by the mere threat of such lawsuit, and the courts have enforced the non-compete in the cases Amazon did take legal action.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#43

Post by Spooky23 »

tranchms wrote: post #22
sbjustin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is the average person doesn't have the money to pay a lawyer to fight off a company - especially the ones with teams of lawyers who need something to do.

If you’re the “average person”, you have nothing to worry about. Trust me. Non-competes really only matter for people with exceptional knowledge of something. From a business standpoint, the legal resources to build a case against a single “average person” who signs a generic non-compete are not a good investment. But like I said, it’s a judgement call. Anyone in the possession of that exceptional knowledge should be…

Not true. A friend is a PA working in emergency medicine. Nobody will touch her with a 10 foot pole. She needs to commute almost two hours or change fields to get out of her non-compete.

There was also an issue that resulted in state legal action where fast food workers were blackballed due to non-competes.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#45

Post by paulie_a »

I've dealt with a non compete before and it was literally telling the previous company to go away. I used an excessive amount of swear words in my official response. After consulting a lawyer I learned for the most part they are just a bluff. Obviously you can't steal ip but even if the non compete was enforceable, it's usually a scare tactic. Call the bluff. More than likely those workers only think they are trapped because it sounds scary.

Edit: downvoted of course, but seriously under most cases the company will not pursue it and it was likely unenforceable in the first place. It's a scare tactic by employers and pretend control over their employees. They are bullshit. I'd like to hire an employee that flat out said "yeah I'm not signing that, it's bullshit" it shows they actually have a bit of grit regarding pointless non legally binding paperwork.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#46

Post by djsumdog »

deogeo wrote: post #44

Shockingly, 'right to work' laws don't forbid non-competes.

'right to work' has nothing to do with labour laws. A 'right to work' state only requires that unions are not mandatory. They hurt unions because everyone usually benefits from union negotiations, but in right to work states, they don't get the same funding.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#47

Post by djsumdog »

harry8 wrote: post #6

noncompetes work even when illegal and unenforceable. Why, because you or many of your potential employers don't want the massive cost and emotional toll of being sued - even if you win you lose. That's all google, facebook, microsoft, etc. you know the companies that we KNOW are guilty of operating a cartel to drive down wages. That's all they need. This baseless illegal, legally unenforcable contract provision mean…

This is very true. I knew someone who couldn't get a job with another advertising firm because he had signed a non-compete. Even though they're not enforceable, no company wants to hired from another company where they know those companies sign non-competes (and hence they could be in for a court case).

This situation is real and I've seen it happen more than once.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#48

Post by kokokokoko »

andyidsinga wrote: post #20

fwiw - here's a FAQ on non-competes in oregon: https://www.oregon.gov/boli/TA/Pages/ta_faq_noncompete.aspx

I've found Oregon's law to be something that could be a reasonable and realistic compromise on a national level. I personally would like to remove them completely as I feel like they are very Anti-American in spirit, but Oregon has something that addresses some of the worse abuses of non-competes and seems like it could make ground politically.

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#49

Post by djsumdog »

I've always refused to sign any contract with a non-compete. In every case, the employer has removed or voided it. The only exceptions were jobs in Chicago, and I walked away from two different jobs because they couldn't change their contract.

I often don't even bring it up during the interview, until I get an offer. At that point if they're not willing to negotiate my basic rights as a worker, it's not a company I want to work for and I'm glad I've wasted their time.

Always demand to see the offer letter/agreement first before you accept, and don't be afraid to walk away if it contains a non-compete. They've screwed over at least two friends of mine and they're totally not worth it. I've written about my experiences with non-competes before:

https://penguindreams.org/blog/why-i-dont-sign-non-competes/

Re: Too Many Workers Are Trapped by Non-Competes

#50

Post by sitkack »

There is a section on Arxiv called "Physics and Society" [0] that has papers with titles like, "Inference of Demographic Attributes based on Mobile Phone Usage Patterns and Social Network Topology" [1], that would be a perfect place to explore the mathematical and empirical answer to the question, "what is the ratio and shape of the number of folks in an economy that have non-competes and what is the result".

My hunch is that it is relatively small. I couldn't find the paper on a very small ratio of folks can flip a population's opinions. I seem to recall it being 5-10% but could be mistaken.

[0] https://arxiv.org/list/physics.soc-ph/recent

[1] https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.02932

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