Yesterday, 10:04 PM
Under the status quo redcoat tyranny that has been occupying DC since 9/11, no contract with any commercial entity is consensual or voluntary in any meaningful sense. Does the inmate have a consensual relationship with the prison contractor who puts slop on his tray in the chow hall? If he has the choice between cornbread or wheat bread, is this a truly "voluntary" choice?
I am a high-tech engineer and, throughout my entire career, I have been subject to ironclad non-competes (usually 10 pages long, or more) forbidding any form of technical work outside of my day-job or any kind of work that the company might construe in any manner to be in competition with them, up to and including ideas that may form in my mind while employed in my position, an absurd and utterly unenforceable clause, unless you were to intentionally betray yourself under oath. I have never been in a position to "shop" between employers based on the looseness/strictness of their non-competes, nor have I known anybody that could, including colleagues with salary in the mid-six-figure range. In short, the idea that anybody working in tech who is not a household-name rockstar could negotiate the terms of a non-compete is downright silly. The company simply dictates the non-compete, and you sign it if you want to work there. In 2015, I had an offer in-hand from one of the FAANG companies but I mentioned that I had a patent idea that I wanted to protect before joining, and they dropped me like a hot-potato. I was an unperson after that.
While tyranny (banning certain kinds of private contracts) can't solve other tyranny (implicit monopoly privilege enjoyed by corporations in dictating practically all terms of employment except the salary), the idea that non-compete agreements are "voluntary" is naive to the point of being silly. It is my opinion that non-competes basically wouldn't exist in a free market in labor, but I can't prove that. In any case, I don't think this particular rule is going to do much harm, although I'm not sure it will do any good, either.
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