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No. What you're proposing only partially addresses one aspect of the issue: the financial fairness to the (no-longer-)employee. It actually doesn't even manage

No. What you're proposing only partially addresses one aspect of the issue: the financial fairness to the (no-longer-)employee. It actually doesn't even manage to do that very well -- because employees can't advance their careers, learn new skills, and get promotions/raises when they're unemployed. So they're still falling behind compared to someone who is employed. Beyond that, it fails to account for all the other harms of non-competes -- such as the emotional toll it takes on that person (having no work to do is not something everyone considers a blessing at every point in their life), as well as the damage it inflicts on the rest of society as a whole.

kodah 3y ago
> because employees can't advance their careers, learn new skills, and get promotions/raises when they're unemployed I think an employee could, just not in that industry. In software that's relatively easy, I switch between two different fields and industries every other job. I'd be curious about adjacent fields for engineers working on tires like in GPs example.
bitwize 3y ago
I think meaningful work is at least as important to the brain as Omega-3s. My father started experiencing memory issues after retiring, but then he took up some part-time engineering contract work and the memory issues went away. My mother sank into deep depression after retiring... and not long after that, the dementia started setting in.
- nine_k 3y ago
  It's so much easier to find an occupation that consumes your mental energy if you don't have to think about earning money for some time!
vegetablepotpie 3y ago
I think the whole point is to call the bluff. If it’s really valuable IP that they protecting with a non-compete, then it would be worth it to pay someone a mandatory vacation upon leaving. But how often are non-compete clauses really meant to protect IP? Most of the time it’s a tool to depress wages, they know it, we know it, they know we know it. No one is being fooled here that’s all it is. If you put a price on non-competes, they will go away.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > But how often are non-compete clauses really meant to protect IP? I would venture never. Or nearly never. A noncompete is a terrible way to protect IP.
- dataflow 3y ago
  > If you put a price on non-competes, they will go away. Unless they calculate that competition would have a higher price, in which case, they might not go away for everyone.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- roenxi 3y ago
  Paying someone not to work is a complete waste of resources. This isn't an area where people should be trying to come up with clever rules-lawyer contracts - someone able & willing to work sitting around not doing something is a huge waste for society, the person and whoever needs the work done. It is probably going too far to ban the practice all-together, but no company should ever have the ability to stop someone from taking a job at a different company, today, if the pay is right. No union either for that matter, although that is a more controversial stance.

kodah 3y ago

> because employees can't advance their careers, learn new skills, and get promotions/raises when they're unemployed I think an employee could, just not in that industry. In software that's relatively easy, I switch between two different fields and industries every other job. I'd be curious about adjacent fields for engineers working on tires like in GPs example.

bitwize 3y ago

I think meaningful work is at least as important to the brain as Omega-3s. My father started experiencing memory issues after retiring, but then he took up some part-time engineering contract work and the memory issues went away. My mother sank into deep depression after retiring... and not long after that, the dementia started setting in.

nine_k 3y ago
It's so much easier to find an occupation that consumes your mental energy if you don't have to think about earning money for some time!

vegetablepotpie 3y ago

I think the whole point is to call the bluff. If it’s really valuable IP that they protecting with a non-compete, then it would be worth it to pay someone a mandatory vacation upon leaving. But how often are non-compete clauses really meant to protect IP? Most of the time it’s a tool to depress wages, they know it, we know it, they know we know it. No one is being fooled here that’s all it is. If you put a price on non-competes, they will go away.

JohnFen 3y ago
> But how often are non-compete clauses really meant to protect IP? I would venture never. Or nearly never. A noncompete is a terrible way to protect IP.
dataflow 3y ago
> If you put a price on non-competes, they will go away. Unless they calculate that competition would have a higher price, in which case, they might not go away for everyone.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
roenxi 3y ago
Paying someone not to work is a complete waste of resources. This isn't an area where people should be trying to come up with clever rules-lawyer contracts - someone able & willing to work sitting around not doing something is a huge waste for society, the person and whoever needs the work done. It is probably going too far to ban the practice all-together, but no company should ever have the ability to stop someone from taking a job at a different company, today, if the pay is right. No union either for that matter, although that is a more controversial stance.