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FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

ftc.gov

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Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#271

Post by cryptonector »

mattmaroon wrote: post #91
aidenn0 wrote: post #64

I am 100% for this, but it makes me sad that the legislative branch has nearly completely abandoned its duty to pass laws in favor of granting the executive branch the authority to regulate just about everything. This is a problem for two main reasons: 1. The executive branch can unilaterally revoke these regulations, making them more volatile. Maybe my non-compete is invalid today, but will it be in 4 years when I a…

While your points are good, on the other hand, Congress at this point is totally broken, it’s hard to imagine it becoming unbroken (since it would require an amendment which is usually passed by Congress and they have no desire to make things harder for themselves), and it’s beholden to special interests in a way that the executive branch often isn’t. So at least this way, things can get done.

> Congress at this point is totally broken

If Congress can delegate authority at will and with tremendous vagueness vagueness (as in the case of the FTC) then that allows Congress to be more disfunctional. If the Court reverses Chevron and later guts the FTC then Congress will have to get its act together -- they might not, but if they do then the Court will have helped us enormously.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#272

Post by xpe »

oceanplexian wrote: post #258
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FTC doesn't really have the ability to do this, since contract law is part of state law The federal government can absolutely regulate both employment and contract law. (Merger agreements are contracts. The FTC was established to block bad mergers.) Whether the FTC can do this is untested. But that’s more a Chevron issue than a federal powers one.

Chances are extremely high that the current Supreme Court nullifies or greatly restricts Chevron. These kind of announcements are fuel for the fire and are likely to accelerate its demise. They will kill this faster than they killed the COVID vaccine mandate. Govt. agencies can’t make laws, even if we may agree with them (I actually do in this case). However this isn’t the role of an unelected government agency.

It is wise to look at an argument with extra caution when you see the phrase “unelected government agency”.

There are (of course) valid powers available to agencies. The question is what powers are valid.

Beware the dark arts of rhetoric. I’m familiar with spotting this one because my constitutional law professor used it often. He helped us to see right through it.

Logic and argumentation should win, not words designed to scare or muddle.

Intellectually honest comments reveal their fundamental guiding moral and political philosophies, rather than painting a one sided picture.

Edits done as of 6:30 pm eastern time.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#273

Post by ClumsyPilot »

crote wrote: post #131
akira2501 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've always thought of that as representing a stifling of innovation. The short lifetime of patents and the requirement that you publish detailed information about the invention significantly mitigates this. If they were measuring innovation by the number of copyrights filed, then I might agree with you.

In theory? Yes. In practice? No. For a lot of industries 20 years is an awfully long time to the point of complete irrelevance - and that "detailed information" is often vague enough to be unusable. Combine that with an overly-broad range of patent-able things and an overworked USPTO granting clearly invalid patents, and in practice (at least in the tech/software world) it's doing more harm than good. Patents are no…

> overworked USPTO granting clearly invalid patents

Well no system can work that way - if judges in court were overworked and making invalid judgements, then the legal system would fail no matter what kind of laws you have and no matter what police does

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#277

Post by cryptonector »

aidenn0 wrote: post #113
jjtheblunt wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The executive branch can unilaterally revoke these regulations The US Constitution + amendments delineates the powers of the branches. Is the situation you describe possibly a window in time when executive branch constitutional overreach has not been yet challenged? [ edit : great explanations below -> sincere thanks ]

Congress created the FTC, congress could eliminate or curtail the FTC's power. Some have argued that it's unconstitutional for congress to give away its power (even conditionally) in this way, but AFAIK that's a rather fringe legal theory. Certainly the FTC has existed for over 100 years at this point, so there's been plenty of time to challenge it.

The major questions doctrine announced in W. Virginia vs. EPA, and the upcoming, likely reversal of Chevron together will greatly limit the Congress' ability delegate power broadly to the Executive. You might call that a "fringe legal theory", but it seems poised to be the legal theory of the land.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#278

Post by ClumsyPilot »

vkou wrote: post #269
crakenzak wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year Insane to me that they use this as a measure of innovation, when almost by definition it is the antithesis of innovation.

What objective metric would you recommend they use, instead?

Productivity improvement in a physical application - it now takes fewer people less time to build a house

It takes less resources to remedy a failed over bridge. You’d have to have a basket of measurement like how we measure CPI - current approach is lazy.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#279

Post by EasyMark »

akira2501 wrote: post #100
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #59

Full text of the ruling here: https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/noncompete-rule... It's not surprising after thinking about it for a minute, but it did startle me to read that the FTC measures innovation by the number of patents issued. > In addition, the final rule is expected to help drive innovation, leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year for the next 10 year…

> I've always thought of that as representing a stifling of innovation. The short lifetime of patents and the requirement that you publish detailed information about the invention significantly mitigates this. If they were measuring innovation by the number of copyrights filed, then I might agree with you.

How is the lifetime of patents short? I mean they last for 20 years, that's an entire generation of time to make a profit?
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