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Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

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Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#141

Post by bluGill »

paxys wrote: post #40

Over the years so many different jurisdictions around the US and the world have stated their desire to be the "next Silicon Valley" and have poured an immense amount of money and effort to make it so, whether in the form of incentives for businesses, tax breaks, education, job training, or even just straight paying smart people to move there. Every such scheme has generally failed because they refused to emulate the…

The real danger is if you don't train your people and they stay. That risk is why you train everyone even those who leave.

For cases of expensive training it is fair to demand they pay you back if you don't stay for a couple years. We are talking about a full masters at a major university though, not just some random 3 day design patterns class or whatever the hotness of the day is.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#142

Post by Eleison23 »

ghaff wrote: post #111
harry8 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Beyond banning them de-jure you've also got to ban them de-facto. "We all know non-competes are unenforceable and illegal." There are no consequences for forcing someone to have the stress, expense, time and to secure the financing so that if everything works as it should (which it often doesn't in all the various legal systems) you get only some of that back. If it doesn't work as it should you're toast. Not a nice…

I worked for a very small company. We wouldn’t hire anyone with a non-compete end of story end of discussion. Just wasn’t a risk or cost management was willing to even entertain.

How would you know they had one? What is the process for disclosing or discovering non-competes? Ostensibly part of a private citizen's employment contract, that's a confidential document.

So what basis would a prospective employer have to request a copy, and how would said third party verify its authenticity?

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#143

Post by bluGill »

diob wrote: post #136
lazide wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason it’s relevant is because that is literally what a non compete is supposed to be for .

This is talking about non competes that apply after one is no longer employed. Yours is something entirely different.

Different and yet his is a lot more valid than want most are

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#144

Post by lazide »

diob wrote: post #136
lazide wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason it’s relevant is because that is literally what a non compete is supposed to be for .

This is talking about non competes that apply after one is no longer employed. Yours is something entirely different.

If it was different, then he would have been fine once he was fired no?

But that is not the case.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#145

Post by makestuff »

bdw5204 wrote: post #127
paxys wrote: post #40

Over the years so many different jurisdictions around the US and the world have stated their desire to be the "next Silicon Valley" and have poured an immense amount of money and effort to make it so, whether in the form of incentives for businesses, tax breaks, education, job training, or even just straight paying smart people to move there. Every such scheme has generally failed because they refused to emulate the…

I'm fine with allowing non-competes as long as the company pays the ex-employee their full salary for the length of the non-compete and can't rescind the non-compete without mutual consent. For example, an 18 month non-compete would mean 18 months of paid vacation after you leave a job. I imagine this would be functionally equivalent to a ban on non-competes because it seems like it'd be an insane waste of money but…

Yeah that is pretty common in the hedge fund/trading world. They call it garden leave and you get your base salary for usually 6-18 months. The downside to that is you only get your base salary which is usually a fraction of the expected bonus.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#146

Post by ska »

divbzero wrote: post #130
bdw5204 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm fine with allowing non-competes as long as the company pays the ex-employee their full salary for the length of the non-compete and can't rescind the non-compete without mutual consent. For example, an 18 month non-compete would mean 18 months of paid vacation after you leave a job. I imagine this would be functionally equivalent to a ban on non-competes because it seems like it'd be an insane waste of money but…

Paying to delay competitors could be a good use of money for companies in many circumstances. That would work fine for an individual from a financial perspective, but keeping talent away from work is suboptimal for society as a whole.

> but keeping talent away from work is suboptimal for society

I think this is basically a non-issue in practice. People with such iron-clad non-competes typically either a) take a non competing job, or b) work on something anyway. The latter effectively means the original company funds some research.

If you do this with say, sales people, or traders, or whatever, it shuts down their work. If you do it with engineers they'll just make something at home.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#147

Post by jaxn »

noasaservice wrote: post #84
jaxn wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every admin assistant should be under an NDA / Confidentiality agreement. Same for personal security. But those are not non-competes.

If they're that important, then the company should pay a significant percentage of their pay to keep them from doing their profession, or GTFO.

I am saying that they do NOT have non-competes.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#148

Post by kbos87 »

I am technically held to a non-compete by my employer, but it honestly never crosses my mind. If push came to shove and I wanted to move on to somewhere they had a problem with, I feel like odds are tiny that they'd do anything close to trying to enforce it. It's a terrible look to come after your employees based on a non-compete, and I bet most brand-conscious employers would think twice about the value in actually testing it.

Re: Laws barring noncompete clauses spreading

#150

Post by ghaff »

Eleison23 wrote: post #142
ghaff wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for a very small company. We wouldn’t hire anyone with a non-compete end of story end of discussion. Just wasn’t a risk or cost management was willing to even entertain.

How would you know they had one? What is the process for disclosing or discovering non-competes? Ostensibly part of a private citizen's employment contract, that's a confidential document. So what basis would a prospective employer have to request a copy, and how would said third party verify its authenticity?

You ask them. And you probably have little interest in seeing a copy in my example. Just if there is one.

Yes, they can presumably lie to you. But if you then so much as get a letter from a lawyer at that point, you fire them at a minimum.

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