[Discuss] OT - new legislation limiting use of "non-competition agreements"

[slitt at troubleshooters.com (Steve Litt)]

On Mon, 20 Aug 2018 16:32:12 +0000
Mike Small <smallm at sdf.org> wrote:

> Steve Litt <slitt at troubleshooters.com> writes:
> > I wish everyone would ask, ahead of time, to read all employment
> > papers they're required to sign, and before resigning their old
> > position, walk away from anyone trying to ram non-compete down
> > their throats. The way employers get away with this stuff is most
> > people sign stuff without reading it, and also, by the time they're
> > presented with the non-compete, they've resigned their old job.  
> 
> That implies we feel we have alternatives

You do have alternatives:

* Stay at your current job, and keep looking
* Stay unemployed and keep looking
* Accept a lesser salary in exchange for eliminating non-compete
* Start your own business
* Look for very small employers without employment contracts
* Start your own business
* Change professions to one without non-competes
* Move to California, where non-competes are illegal
* Move to a country where they're illegal

> and some sense of a
> bargaining position. 

If you have no bargaining position in this economy, what's going to
happen to you during the next downturn? Now, in this good economy, how
do you ask for a raise or raise your rates (if you're a contractor)?

> Heck, I wouldn't even be seen publicly
> commenting on this topic.  Oh darn.

If you really mean the preceding, that's the best proof at all that you
shouldn't sign these things.

Do you sign contracts that usurp all your copyrights and patents and
inventions, regardless of relevance to the employer or the fact that
they were done on your own time? What if the author of the Harry Potter
books had done that?

There's an old saying: If you're not part of the solution, you're part
of the problem. I'll keep saying it: I wish everyone would ask, ahead
of time, to read all employment papers they're required to sign, and
before resigning their old position, walk away from anyone trying to
ram non-compete down their throats.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
September 2018 featured book: Quit Joblessness: Start Your Own Business
http://www.troubleshooters.com/startbiz