Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

ftc.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 530 posts

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#91

Post by mattmaroon »

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.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#93

Post by paxys »

My prediction – this will be litigated in courts for the next few years until eventually being struck down by the supreme court in a 6-3 decision. And if Trump becomes president we won't even need to wait that long.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#94

Post by mattmaroon »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #85
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…

> 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 ]

It’s not overreach, it’s delegation by Congress to the executive parent is discussing. Congress often gives the executive the right to regulate things instead of regulating it themselves, and it’s a controversial topic.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#95

Post by sailfast »

fabianhjr wrote: post #41
timf wrote: post #26

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is likely to file suit: https://www.uschamber.com/finance/antitrust/chamber-comments...

I thought that non-governmental business association was pro-competition; guess not. Edit: it was a dig to the pro-competition façade some pro-business people put forward.

They are pro-business (and maintaining the rights of businesses to control their labor force), not pro-competition.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#96

Post by buildbot »

fidotron wrote: post #12

> Under the final rule, existing noncompetes for senior executives can remain in force. Employers, however, are prohibited from entering into or enforcing new noncompetes with senior executives. The final rule defines senior executives as workers earning more than $151,164 annually and who are in policy-making positions. Lot's of devs will be surprised to discover they are in policy making positions.

Yep, this would impact basically any dev at Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, etc. From my own point of view (at MS), policy making decision do basically happen at my/our level too, unless policy is on the tier of "buyout Infection.AI talent". Any kind of planning research/work could be considered policy. Decisions like what kind of framework or listing to use? Policy!

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#97

Post by lokar »

kevstev wrote: post #43
cjen wrote: post #24

This seems incredibly important. I know non-compete rules personally held me back at a previous tech job. I'm interested to see how this hits finance firms – I know people who were forced to take a year off between jobs (although they were compensated the whole time). Always thought that would be a pretty sweet deal.

I was subject to one as well, but it was just on my base, not total comp, which was not the majority of my compensation. And while my base was fine, it was more or less explicitly stated that this was meant to make it painful for employees to leave and had almost zero to do with any special information the employee had.

They have other tricks. My comp was about 80% bonus, most of which went into deferred comp for a few years. If I was to go to a competitor without permission (independent of the non compete) I would forfeit the deferred comp.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#98

Post by [deleted] »

ein0p wrote: post #62
a_wild_dandan wrote: post #19

This is a stunning change. We already have a uniquely strong economy. If the US keeps trending toward tackling anti-competitive behavior, we may avoid a downturn for quite awhile!

Anyone can have a “strong economy” if they can print $2T a year. The question is for how long.

[deleted]

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#99

Post by zer00eyz »

macintux wrote: post #36
timf wrote: post #26

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is likely to file suit: https://www.uschamber.com/finance/antitrust/chamber-comments...

I suspect this won’t survive a challenge in front of the current Supreme Court, unfortunately.

I am not entirely sure.

Without anti compete stealing your competitors staff becomes a valid business strategy. Buy up the competitions best people and cripple them.

This favors those with the most capital not the least.

Re: FTC announces rule banning noncompetes

#100

Post by akira2501 »

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.

Post reply on HN