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U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

nytimes.com

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Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#261

Post by asveikau »

ecshafer wrote: post #21

Non-Competes being legal is only acceptable I think if the worker will continued being paid for the period of the non-compete. I can see reasons that non-competes exist, but those reasons don't really make sense in a world where patents and trademarks also exist. The fact that they are essentially illegal in California, and California's economy works shows that they are unnecessary and also don't hinder technological…

One of the biggest problems I see with non competes is that "competition" can be subjective, especially in a world of large employers with extremely diversified business interests.

Eg. If you move from one big tech co to another, you may be technically moving to a competitor, but the subject matter of your work could be unrelated.

This is probably true of other industries too.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#263

Post by Fargren »

yardie wrote: post #212
drewda wrote: post #179

As the saying goes, California is the United States... just 30 years in the future. (Note that often this is a good pattern, but not always!)

If thats true the rest of the US is going to be on fire, have an abundance of homeless, and high speed rail still won't happen.

Those seem like reasonable predictions.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#264

Post by [deleted] »

monksy wrote: post #252
ecshafer wrote: post #21

Non-Competes being legal is only acceptable I think if the worker will continued being paid for the period of the non-compete. I can see reasons that non-competes exist, but those reasons don't really make sense in a world where patents and trademarks also exist. The fact that they are essentially illegal in California, and California's economy works shows that they are unnecessary and also don't hinder technological…

Non-competes do not protect an organization against IP theft or trade sceret dismenination. Those are portected by NDAs, confidentiality agreements, copyrights, patents, etc. Non-competes limit where your staff can go to. Without proper compensation for the time period in which they apply for, they're a very one sided (and in some cases illegal [NCs are legal in IL unless they assert an economic hardship]) way to pre…

[deleted]

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#265

Post by berniedurfee »

eclipsetheworld wrote: post #27

In Germany we have non-competes, however, the employer has to continue paying the ex-employee (a part of) their salary for the non-compete to have any effect.

Sadly, this concept somehow feels very much counter to American culture.

I don’t think this would ever be implemented here.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#266

Post by lostdog »

r00fus wrote: post #226
manicennui wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the "loser" in this situation is the only group that politicians really care about.

How did the supposed captured government agency (FTC) happen to even propose this? Is it a) FTC is not captured b) proposal that goes nowhere (ie, Lucy with the football scenario) or c) perhaps that "group politicians really care about" realize the gains may be worth the cost ?

The FTC is a bit less captured currently because of its current head.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#267

Post by snowwrestler »

gen220 wrote: post #253

I think we're all pretty familiar with the arguments against non-competes. Does anybody have a compelling argument for them, as practiced in 2023 in the US? While we're at it, does anybody have a compelling justification for allowing non-poach agreements, too? From my perspective, they both seem like a non-durable benefit to $current_employer at the expense of a compounding opportunity cost to the greater economy (in…

The argument is basically that trade secrets violations are incredibly hard to detect and pursue. You can’t see inside a person’s brain, and (short of industrial espionage) you can’t see inside a competitor either. So a person could come work for you, gain some knowledge of your trade secrets, and then go get a huge offer from a competitor based on that knowledge.

In contrast, it is extremely easy to detect a person’s employer.

I’m not saying this is a valid or correct argument, I’m saying this is one of the arguments.

Another argument (that I know less about) is that there is knowledge that is valuable and proprietary, but does not actually qualify as “trade secrets” under those laws.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#268

Post by mumblemumble »

jacobr1 wrote: post #230
mumblemumble wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the standard I knew from the trading industry. I would say that, while it does initially seem more palatable, it also has some downsides. One that might be particularly relevant to programmers is that it sets up a structure that functions somewhat like a penalty of 1 year's worth of paid vacation for choosing a new job outside the industry. I don't have the business or economic bonafides to back this up, but…

Even in California, you can get sued for violating an NDA when going to competitor if you bring private technical data, which seems like a reasonable compromise. You can bring your expertise, but no code. Intersecting with this are patents. A company can also protect its IP with patents, but when should choose to disallow, or have more liberal patent laws? It seems there are similar tradeoff between the value to comp…

Also no material non-public information even if it's not technically technical.

The standard I'm familiar with is, knowledge you acquired during your time at a previous employer is safe to share with your current one if you can support it with a citation.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#269

Post by chadash »

fendy3002 wrote: post #242
jacobr1 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree these are system-wide less efficient, but shouldn't paid "garden leave" be legal if parties agree upfront?

Well if all companies are doing it, employees will have no option other than to agree. This is the current case with non compete afaik.

There's a big difference. Paid gardening leave means that the employer actually has skin in the game. I'd bet that 9 times out of 10 they won't actually enforce these non-competes if they actually have to bear some cost (certain industries might be exceptions). The problem with the status quo is that an employer will have the non-compete in play regardless of whether the "competition" would really hurt them.

Re: U.S. moves to bar noncompete agreements in labor contracts

#270

Post by QuercusMax »

gen220 wrote: post #253

I think we're all pretty familiar with the arguments against non-competes. Does anybody have a compelling argument for them, as practiced in 2023 in the US? While we're at it, does anybody have a compelling justification for allowing non-poach agreements, too? From my perspective, they both seem like a non-durable benefit to $current_employer at the expense of a compounding opportunity cost to the greater economy (in…

Only thing that comes to mind is a scenario where a sales person goes to another company and takes all their sales leads with them. This happened at a previous employer, at which time they instituted noncompetes for all the salespeople and most of the engineering force.

They forgot to have me and several other very senior engineers sign the noncompete, which was extremely hilarious to me when I went to another company in roughly the same industry and my old boss asked me about it...

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