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I'm not so sure it's a "start". They had a chance to fix it, and they chose to legislate protections that fall short of that. From a lawmaking perspective, it

I'm not so sure it's a "start". They had a chance to fix it, and they chose to legislate protections that fall short of that. From a lawmaking perspective, it can be construed as "we looked at the issue, and found low-level employees to be worthy of protection, but nobody else." > The article also specifies that laid-off workers are exempt. Even in states where non-competes are generally enforceable, courts are often reluctant to enforce them against laid-off employees. But guess what? Big corporations have little interest in enforcing non-competes against poorly performing employees. Take a look at the article I linked elsewhere, to see what type of employees Amazon chooses to selectively target for non-compete violations. They are the well-performing employees who jumped ship for a better opportunity elsewhere. Their goal is to discourage this behavior, so they don't risk losing their best employees or (heavens forbid!) paying them their market value. I don't know of a single case where they sued a poorly-performing, fired, or laid off employee.

emodendroket 8y ago
I don't know about Amazon, but the earlier articles people posted on the subject did have a lot of people who were let go and then had non-competes enforced against them.
- dunpeal 8y ago
  Interesting, do you have a link?
  - emodendroket 8y ago
    https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/business/noncompete-clauses-increasingly-pop-up-in-array-of-jobs.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/business/noncompete-claus... > Daniel McKinnon, who had been a hairstylist in Norwell, Mass., lost a court battle with his former employer who claimed that Mr. McKinnon had violated the terms of his agreement when he went to work at a nearby salon. Mr. McKinnon said that he did not think the original restriction — to wait at least 12 months before working at any salon in nearby towns — still applied because he had been fired after years of friction with the manager there. Shortly after being fired, he went to work at a nearby salon. > But a judge issued an injunction ordering him to stop working at his new employer. > “It was pretty lousy that you would take away someone’s livelihood like that,” said Mr. McKinnon, who for the following year lived off jobless benefits of $300 a week. “I almost lost my truck. I almost lost my apartment. Almost everything came sweeping out from under me.”
    - dunpeal 8y ago
      Despicable. Seems like MA is one of the worst states as far as non-compete enforcement goes. I remember reading analysis that non-competes would generally be unenforceable against terminated employees even in states that do typically enforce them.
allenofthehills 8y ago
> From a lawmaking perspective, it can be construed as "we looked at the issue, and found low-level employees to be worthy of protection, but nobody else." I think a political perspective is probably more relevant/accurate which would likely be along the lines of "we looked at the issue, and protecting low-level employees is the most we could do and still get the bill passed" Obviously large employers have vested interests in protecting non-competes and also have the lobbying budgets to successfully oppose the passage of stronger individual protection from non-competes

emodendroket 8y ago

I don't know about Amazon, but the earlier articles people posted on the subject did have a lot of people who were let go and then had non-competes enforced against them.

dunpeal 8y ago
Interesting, do you have a link?
- emodendroket 8y ago
  https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/business/noncompete-clauses-increasingly-pop-up-in-array-of-jobs.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/business/noncompete-claus... > Daniel McKinnon, who had been a hairstylist in Norwell, Mass., lost a court battle with his former employer who claimed that Mr. McKinnon had violated the terms of his agreement when he went to work at a nearby salon. Mr. McKinnon said that he did not think the original restriction — to wait at least 12 months before working at any salon in nearby towns — still applied because he had been fired after years of friction with the manager there. Shortly after being fired, he went to work at a nearby salon. > But a judge issued an injunction ordering him to stop working at his new employer. > “It was pretty lousy that you would take away someone’s livelihood like that,” said Mr. McKinnon, who for the following year lived off jobless benefits of $300 a week. “I almost lost my truck. I almost lost my apartment. Almost everything came sweeping out from under me.”
  - dunpeal 8y ago
    Despicable. Seems like MA is one of the worst states as far as non-compete enforcement goes. I remember reading analysis that non-competes would generally be unenforceable against terminated employees even in states that do typically enforce them.

allenofthehills 8y ago

> From a lawmaking perspective, it can be construed as "we looked at the issue, and found low-level employees to be worthy of protection, but nobody else." I think a political perspective is probably more relevant/accurate which would likely be along the lines of "we looked at the issue, and protecting low-level employees is the most we could do and still get the bill passed" Obviously large employers have vested interests in protecting non-competes and also have the lobbying budgets to successfully oppose the passage of stronger individual protection from non-competes