40 ms·

NY Governor vetoes ban on noncompete clauses, waters down LLC transparency bill

370 points by dataflow 3y ago

suby 3y ago
She also (previously) watered down the right to repair bill. She is... not the best. https://www.engadget.com/new-york-right-to-repair-law-kathy-hochul-184654713.html https://www.engadget.com/new-york-right-to-repair-law-kathy-...
- asah 3y ago
  Watering down is standard for politicians responding to social change. This is the first step.
- r00fus 3y ago
  There's a reason she almost lost to the extremist Zeldin. She's completely owned by Wall Street.
  - kernal 3y ago
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    - NotSammyHagar 3y ago
      Can you share the terrible things that his extremist org has done? I see he supports unpopular and extremists things like 1. abortion rights 2. civil rights 3. keeping the govt working by funding it 4. helping american manufacturing 5. blocking the dictatorship in russia from taking over the small democracy next door.
      - kernal 3y ago
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        NotSammyHagar 3y ago
        This isn't a serious list, almost all of these are just political talking points with no substance. I will agree the withdrawal from Afghanistan was extremely poorly done. Yes, he was following the treaty trump had negotiated with the other side (was that neg. with terrorists?) but it was poorly done. A lot more soldiers died pointlessly in Iraq and no one saw it as a war crime on Bush2. The us had secret prisons. My country kidnapped people and tortured them in black prisons. That's a crime too. I'd like to prosecute that. The justice dept raided trumps home because he (1) had a long list of secret docs he wasn't supposed to keep (2) he was recorded on his own video call with his own lawyers where he talked about having them, that he shouldn't have them, and he knew they were still top secret because he specifically discussed that he hadn't changed their classification (3) asked him to give them back and he kind of gave a few back (4) asked him again for the things that were in the call and he didn't give them back. Then he asked people working for him to lie about the whole affair. Some of them turned state's evidence. Your points don't stand up to scrutiny. Among other things, ex-presidents are subject to the rule of law.
        dang 3y ago
        Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. We don't care about which political side you're on but we do care about not having those sorts of comments here. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
      - bigstrat2003 3y ago
        > abortion rights I'm not trying to debate abortion for the millionth time here, but you can't just slip that one in like it's some anodyne proposition that no reasonable person objects to. The fact of the matter is that abortion is still fiercely debated in this country, with its detractors considering it no different from infanticide. So if the Biden administration supports abortion rights, there will be many people who consider that to be a heinous position for him to take.
        Shekelphile 3y ago
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        throwup238 3y ago
        > you can't just slip that one in like it's some anodyne proposition that no reasonable person objects to. It's not that no reasonable person can oppose abortion (the objection doesn't even need to be religious in nature), it's that no reasonable person opposes abortion because it's infanticide and opposes all post-natal support policies which is the case in almost all the states that have banned abortion. Hell take a look at the list of states ranked by child mortality and abortion states lead the way by a mile. Welfare and education for mothers and their young children? Rejected. Food stamps? Fuck that. Now there's plenty of debate to be had about the effectiveness and fiscal efficiency of these policies, but anti-abortion states soundly reject the vast majority of them and leave mothers and their children to fend for themselves. Everyone is entitled to their opinion but we don't have to respect their opinions if they are nakedly hypocritical.
  - xyzelement 3y ago
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    - monero-xmr 3y ago
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    - o11c 3y ago
      It's not just a word; you can look at his record of attempting to overthrow democracy (regarding January 6). If overthrowing democracy is no longer considered extremist, what is?
      - koolba 3y ago
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        kevingadd 3y ago
        Accusing Pelosi of conduct equivalent to January 6 is blatantly disingenuous, regardless of your political feelings.
        koolba 3y ago
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        the_gastropod 3y ago
        I don’t recall Pelosi doing that. Have a source?
        koolba 3y ago
        Straight from the horse’s mouth: https://rumble.com/vs7r3v-flashback-pelosi-objects-to-counting-ohio-electoral-votes.html https://rumble.com/vs7r3v-flashback-pelosi-objects-to-counti...
  - matrix87 3y ago
    This is the danger of having shitty gop candidates, then the dems can roll with some uninspiring, corrupt, hillaryesque candidate like Hochul and manage to hold onto power. When one party gets shittier, it allows the other one to get shittier as well
    - akira2501 3y ago
      This is the danger of a two party system. They both have an incentive to disenfranchise voters, because our great loophole is that, a "no" vote actually does not count in any meaningful way. So, if you can get 50% to 75% of the eligible population to not vote, then it becomes much easier to maintain power without actually having to take any responsibility for your actions. It should be that if less than 50% of the eligible population turns out, the election is null, and needs to be re-run. We have a right to say "none of the above" and have it stick. The parties need to bear the costs of creating these terrible ballots and candidates that actually appeal to no one.
      - lukevp 3y ago
        Our HOA elections are unable to proceed without a defined quorum, yet the US has no such rules… strange! I think first past the post is a big part of the issue though, and am holding on hope for ranked choice voting to expand
        Dalewyn 3y ago
        Two things: * Abstention from voting or refusing to vote are a form of political expression. Mandating that everyone must vote is an attack on freedom of speech and expression and will not fly. * Ranked Choice and all the other alternatives often floated run afoul of the most basic criteria: They are complicated. The people either will not or cannot understand and consequently will not tolerate complicated voting schemes. Anything more complicated than "<XYZ> gets my vote." is impractically useless. FPTP remains popular because it is fucking simple enough that anyone can understand it, that it's also generally beneficial to the political parties is merely a side effect.
- deleted 3y ago
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LiquidPolymer 3y ago
California has banned noncompete clauses since 1872. It doesn't seem to have killed innovation or destroyed businesses.
- jseliger 3y ago
  Banning noncompetes is key to California's tech and other industries: https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/2/13/14580874/google-self-driving-noncompetes https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/2/13/14580874/google-self...
  - fragmede 3y ago
    Which leads to the question, is this ban in NJ good for California?
    - chaostheory 3y ago
      It is not. The more bans on non-competes spread in the US, the more the SF Bay Area loses one of its main competitive advantages. Silicon Valley would not exist as a tech leader if non-competes were a thing in California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight https://computerhistory.org/stories/spinoff-fairchild/ https://computerhistory.org/stories/spinoff-fairchild/ https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchildren/ https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchild...
      - deleted 3y ago
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      - lotsofpulp 3y ago
        I don’t think anywhere in the US has a blanket ban on non competes and protection of an employees’ work like California. https://law.justia.com/codes/california/2010/lab/2870-2872.html https://law.justia.com/codes/california/2010/lab/2870-2872.h... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38746969 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38746969
santoshalper 3y ago
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- Racing0461 3y ago
  There is also no legitimate Conservative Party in the us. Just chamber of commerce representatives like mitt Romney that is happy as long as taxes get cut and dod is funded and cedes all other social ground to democrats.
  - TylerE 3y ago
    The US has, by the standard of the rest of the western world, two conservative parties. If you saw what most of the world considers a mildly left centrist, your brain would explode.
    - Racing0461 3y ago
      The US has no conservative party (in economics and culture) sans some guys streaming from their basement with greenscreen on kick and rumble (they got banned from twitch). It's really the battle of who can win (then do the same thing for the billionaires) while virtue signaling to their respective "base" of commoners (both left and right). It's all establishment.
- gotoeleven 3y ago
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  - edrxty 3y ago
    Tell me about all the illegals that took your job, all the shops of yours that have been lifted and all the drugs you have been dealt.
    - kgwxd 3y ago
      And the list of genders decided by a government. Individuals make that list, not the government. One party understands that, the other claims they can define that list. Which one sounds like Big Government to you?
JoshTriplett 3y ago
> Major business interests, including Wall Street firms This seems like the likely answer. New York has a lot more finance-centric companies than California, and they're going to fight to prevent their employees from being able to go to competing firms.
ajb 3y ago
Discussion from before the veto: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38316870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38316870
seydor 3y ago
> vetoes ban on noncompete That's like, a triple negative
- Oarch 3y ago
  Had to read the comments to figure out which way this went!
DueDilligence 3y ago
[dead]
tlogan 3y ago
Currently, it’s evident that our political landscape lacks genuine representation for traditional leftist (liberal) or right-wing (conservative) ideologies. Instead, what we’re witnessing are parties primarily aligned with interests of different companies or verticals, overshadowing the core values and concerns of their supposed political spectrums.
- cogman10 3y ago
  This is what happens when politicians aren't accountable to their constituents. The only people most politicians are accountable to are the big businesses that pay for their campaign finances and super pacs. We desperately need campaign finance reform and strong anti-corruption/bribery laws. After that, voting reform and ranked choice voting would go a long way to making things better.
  - bugglebeetle 3y ago
    The Supreme Court has effectively ruled all forms of political bribery to be legal (and engages in it themselves), so good luck with that one.
    - kmeisthax 3y ago
      Not just legal, but constitutionally protected free speech. Effectively "repeal the first amendment or accept legal bribery".
      - soraminazuki 3y ago
        Paying someone is free speech? I didn't realize I was exercising my free speech rights every time I went to the grocery store. What does speech even mean in that context?
        kmeisthax 3y ago
        Ok, please don't take this comment as a defense of Citizens United and McCutchinson v. FEC, but there is logic to SCOTUS's idea. Imagine for a moment you were, say, a certain Florida governor with Presidential ambitions and an R next to your name. A multibillion dollar mouse cartoon company that runs a local theme park in your state is complaining about a law you passed, and you want them to shut up and fall in line with the party diktat. However, it's unconstitutional to just ban political speech you don't like. So instead you decide to write a bill[0] prohibiting any out-of-state corporation with a certain asset size from spending money in the form of campaign contributions to opposing gubernatorial candidates. Did Florida Man just violate the constitution? If you think so, well, then you believe that money is speech. Or at the very least, that money used to effect political speech (e.g. by lobbying, donating to candidates you want to see elected) should be as protected as speech is. This was actually fairly long-standing SCOTUS precedent, which is probably why they were so willing to tear up campaign finance law. Where SCOTUS goes off the rails in the two cases above is that they then argue that even content-neutral restrictions on moneyspeech are unconstitutional. It's actually fairly well-established doctrine that protests can be regulated - i.e. we're allowed to shift protests at government events (say, the G7) to "free speech zones" that are carefully selected to be as far away from media attention as possible. We're also allowed to have noise laws, even though people use loud megaphones in protests. But we're, apparently, not allowed to have campaign finance laws which are the equivalent of noise laws for talking to your Congressperson. Evidently shouting so loud you speak over everyone else in the room is legal so long as you're speaking with dollars instead of words. [0] This example takes place in an alternate universe where Trump 2000 actually got the man in office, so the culture war brain rot happened earlier than the SCOTUS cases that protected bribery with the 1st Amendment
Scubabear68 3y ago
The LLC transparency stuff drives me nuts. If a company wants LLC guarantees, it should publish who their owners are. It is incredibly frustrating to literally have no idea who is being XYZ LLC. Especially when you have “special purpose vehicle” LLC’s which aren’t really even real companies at all.
- Terr_ 3y ago
  > a company wants LLC guarantees To wit, getting the government to declare it especially exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities that affect everyone else.
  - couchand 3y ago
    > exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities I'm sorry, what are you talking about?
    - Terr_ 3y ago
      https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/limitedliability.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/limitedliability.asp They are ubiquitous today, but at one time each limited liability corporation was individually created by a unique law passed by the legislature, for a specific purpose--often infrastructure projects--and with a fixed lifetime unless renewed again by another law.
      - couchand 3y ago
        Please show me where in that citation is any reference to an LLC being "exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities". As the discussion there indicates, limited liability is a totally normal thing, and despite the name it applies to other corporate structures, notably C and S corporations. So what exactly is the "normal" that you claim LLCs deviate from?
        Scubabear68 3y ago
jorams 3y ago
> ...signed 42 bills late Friday and vetoed another 43, ... of legislation approved by state lawmakers earlier this year. It seems to me something is very broken if half the laws approved by lawmakers are getting vetoed by the governor. Is that normal for states? Does this not lead to an extremely inefficient lawmaking process?
- dataflow 3y ago
  Unfortunately NY isn't really known for efficient government.
- sgift 3y ago
  Imho, that laws the legislative has voted on can just be vetoed by someone who is the head of the executive is the main problem. But this mix of executive and legislative seems to be normal in the US, so maybe my unease is just based on what I'm used to over here in Germany. While the President of Germany formally has to accept all laws it's a far less active role. According to the constitution, he's only allowed to not accept a law if he thinks it either was voted on in a process that's forbidden by the constitution or is itself against the constitution. This has happened only nine times since the federal republic exists. edit: The president is also not the head of the executive, just so no one is confused. The chancellor doesn't have any special role in getting a law accepted.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    It's a practical acknowledgment of the reality that if the executive branch declines to execute a law, there isn't terribly much that can realistically be done.
  - kortilla 3y ago
    The legislative can override the executive by a super majority in the US. It’s a good balance IMO.
    - kmeisthax 3y ago
      And then the executive can null proc the law. The only way to make laws that stick is to include a private right of action so that any enterprising / money-grubbing lawyer can make money enforcing the law you wrote.
cogman10 3y ago
Can anyone here argue why any state should allow noncompete clauses? It seems like something that solely helps business owners and nobody else.
- briHass 3y ago
  The argument is essentially that a noncompete is a voluntary contract, and generally the courts don't want to prevent individuals from freely entering into agreements. Noncompetes already must have 'consideration', which is typically the employment itself.
- edrxty 3y ago
  I think it's a case of people only caring about their specific short term individual interests in the narrowest way possible. They're not really a rational thing in any other domain. Basically, if you have a zero sum game with two companies and one has better IP than the other, it makes sense for the time span through which the company without can't reverse engineer it. In every other case it means the groups of companies under the umbrella of non-competes will slowly loose to groups of companies in jurisdictions without non-competes. To expand on that, if you objectively have some special sauce that you don't want leaked to your competition then it's a net gain for you and a loss for the rest of X industry (where X is finance because they're the ones who want this, not tech). In reality though, it's extremely rare to have sole control over an incredibly strong piece of IP that defines a market. In reality, everyone thinks they do because they don't know what anyone else has. Everyone has something that gives them an edge, hence being competitive in the market, but sharing those secrets within their local area can make the whole industry way more performant. The law applies to everyone so if you can't have non-competes, neither can your competition. At a local level it will make groups of companies much stronger than their more distant competitors because they can share knowledge under the table at a much higher rate.
- kortilla 3y ago
  Things that are good for businesses can be good for society. Trademark laws seem to be useful. Laws against theft seem to be generally nice. Laws against selling company secrets. Contract laws.
ajsnigrutin 3y ago
I understand the need for noncompetes in some areas, but this can be solved differently... In my country (slovenia), if the company wants you to sign a noncompete, they have to decide the length of the noncompete (months, years after you quit) and a monetary compensation has to be written in for the duration of the noncompete. The wording is kinda loose and a few "decided by the court", but this would be an interesting compromise, especially if tweaked a little. So, if you get employed and educated for an eg. rocket scientist, and the company wants you to sign a noncompete, so you could only get a job as a burger flipper, the company would have to pay the difference between what you earn due to a noncompete, and what you'd earn if you continued working the same job (so your previous pay plus inflation + some added percentage as a safety margin).
- hippich 3y ago
  How does it work in practice? Can company write contract saying compensation for non compete is $1/yr?
  - TylerE 3y ago
    What incentive would there be for the employee to sign such an incredibly one sided contract when they could literally go to any other job?
    - JoshTriplett 3y ago
      What incentive is there for the employee to sign a non-compete today that has $0/year compensation for the non-compete duration? However, another comment in this thread suggests that the law in question requires the compensation be the same as that of the job itself, which avoids this issue.
      - tsimionescu 3y ago
        > What incentive is there for the employee to sign a non-compete today that has $0/year compensation for the non-compete duration? If it's the only way to get a job, that's the incentive. If the whole industry does it, or at least the vast majority, then workers don't have an actual choice.
jackfoxy 3y ago
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- zmgsabst 3y ago
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  - deleted 3y ago
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- kmeisthax 3y ago
  Dumb question: has anyone tried arguing that a noncompete is a 14A violation?
  - 4death4 3y ago
    You're allowed to voluntarily sacrifice your rights in private contracts. E.g. an NDA limits your the 1st amendment rights, but it's not unconstitutional to agree to one.
    - kmeisthax 3y ago
      Yes, but there are limits. 14A specifically calls out indentured servitude as one of the things the Constitution does not tolerate. And 14A is one of the few amendments that actually does tie private hands, unlike the rest of the Constitution.
- gen220 3y ago
  New York’s history of progressivism is checkered and contradictory, so the real irony is (unfortunately) that this is not ironic, but rather a highly predictable weave in its tapestry. New York might have abolished slavery in 1827, but they also were the only state to perpetuate literal feudalism until a mini civil war prompted a constitutional rewrite in 1846. The sociopolitical history and the scale of intrigue and corruption within New York would rival most countries. The name Empire State is well-earned.
isuckatcoding 3y ago
Vetoes ban non (compete). This triple negative is definitely not confusing.
- NoboruWataya 3y ago
  How would you write it? It's not like the Governor "didn't not not" do something. Veto, ban, noncompete all have negative connotations but they are very different concepts so don't just cancel each other out like multiple negatives normally would.
jalapenos 3y ago
What I don't get with non-competes is they effectively keep the employee in obligation to the employer, without keeping the reverse. At a minimum, they should have to have paid minimum full-time wage continuously up to the point they attempt to enforce it, for it to be enforceable (in addition to the requirements), and if they haven't when they try to enforce it then it should be treated as a breach of labor laws.
- SnowflakeOnIce 3y ago
  I believe MA (which overhauled its noncompete laws a few years back) requires "garden leave" in the case of a noncompete — the employer would have to pay the employee's salary for the period of enforcement.
- Broken_Hippo 3y ago
  Should be a minimum of salary plus benefits plus approximate (or average) bonus. You shouldn't have to pay more for employer-provided health insurance, for example. You should still get any employer contribution to retirement accounts. You should get an approximation of bonuses you would receive if actively working. And so on. If a company thinks you are worth signing a non-compete, they should pay like you are still employed. Non-competes should be a burden for the company to discourage their use.
  - jalapenos 3y ago
    I don't think that'd be well aligned. The noncompete obligation is present during employment too, but the work obligation doesn't continue after. So getting full price while you can still work elsewhere (just not anywhere) wouldn't be fair. I still say they should be banned outright for the same reason they originally were at common law -- that they restrain trade, which affects third parties.
    - Broken_Hippo 3y ago
      I'd prefer banning as well, but I figure there are probably some reasonable reasons. And I agree, the work obligation doesn't continue after, but I don't think the employee should lose out on pay while they can't work elsewhere in the same field just because the employer wants to keep them from doing so. It should be painful for the company and easy for the employee.
heads 3y ago
As an example: if Coca Cola’s secret is worth $100 but the employees are making $1 each then a rival can poach them for $10 and still get a great return. Coke could split the $100 more fairly but Pepsi still only needs to pay $100/N + 1 to outbid for the secret. Industries based on secret keeping would, over time, corrupt each other out of business until only a few are left. I can see a how the authorities would argue that this eventual monopoly is bad and look ways to artificially put moats around the secrets. I can also see an argument for this kind of business being allowed to natural cease to exist altogether. Are Wall St secrets different in some way? I suppose for a start we’re talking about sales Rolodexes and client relationships which are much more readily available than cola recipes. In that example the employee’s network is the business value, so why shouldn’t they shop around and take their clients with them? Is there a better analogy to help understand the economics of the situation?
- ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
  Stealing or receiving stolen trade secrets is a crime on its own. One of the prescribed penalties is disgorgement of 3x the value of the secrets.
  - heads 3y ago
    I suppose therefore that the basis of a non-compete agreement is that an employee will be so saturated with secrets that they couldn’t possibly work for a competitor without implicitly revealing those secrets? Garden[ing*] leave is the usual solution to this: the employees are paid a salary to stay at home and do nothing during their notice period. They are cut off from the secrets so that by the end of their employment they no longer pose the threat of a leak. That feels like a fairer deal — are the non competes in NY state a kind that are effectively requiring unpaid gardening leave? That does indeed seem wrong *I always preferred the British version of this where the City gentleman spends the leave period tending to his roses rather than just lounging around on the lawn, hence gardening rather than garden leave.
    - ghaff 3y ago
bigdict 3y ago
Not gonna lie, the triple negative tripped me up.
tchock23 3y ago
I’m not a lawyer, but I don’t see the point of non-competes. Non-solicitation agreements cover not stealing clients or employees after you leave. Non-disclosure agreements cover not sharing non-public information. IP assignment agreements cover assignment of all IP created while being employed. Why do non-competes need to exist given the above CYA mechanisms that companies already have? (Edit: the only exception is noted elsewhere in this thread - if you sell your company to another, you shouldn’t be able to turn around and create a competitor right away, but that’s an edge case)
- therealdrag0 3y ago
  Good question. I worked at a company that tried to get everyone to sign noncompetes after a high level sales person left and stole clients. Not sure if consolidation didn’t cover it or if they didn’t have that, and if not why they went with non compete instead.
- caskstrength 3y ago
  > I’m not a lawyer, but I don’t see the point of non-competes. The point obviously is to make it much harder for employees to change jobs and consecutively reduce their wages.
jmyeet 3y ago
Deeply blue states like New York and California don't face a serious threat from Republicans. So what happens? They turn on themselves with sectarian infighting. And there's nothing Democrats in general and New York Democrats in particular hate more progressive candidates. In a district Biden won by 8 in 2020, George Santos was elected in 2022 when Republicans nationally underperformed. And this is a guy who would've been exposed by a $500 background check. Over $100 million was spent to lose to Lindsey Graham by 10 while nothing was spent on Mandela Barnes in Wisconsin who lost by a mere 20,000 votes. I mention all of this as context because Democrats are beholden to the same corporate interests. Their goal isn't to make progressive change. It's not even to win elections. It's really just to fund raise off of how terrible the other side is without the responsibility of having to do anything. My position on noncompetes is a fairly simple one: when you quit, the employer has the option to enforce their noncompete. If they do for whatever the agreed upon period is they pay you 150% of your highest annual total compensation (not just salary) including benefits over the previous 5 years. for that period. Or they can not. It's all or nothing. Failure to pay at any point in that period removes the noncompete from the employer but doesn't discharge the liability. That is, once a noncompete is exercised the employer is on the hook for the entire amount and needs to keep papying on time to keep that noncompete enforced. Does that sound harsh (on the employer)? It's meant to be. Don't want to pay a noncompete? Then don't enforce it.
mixdup 3y ago
Easy compromise on the noncompete front: * Have an income limit below which it doesn't apply * Must be tied to some kind of IP or proprietary knowledge. The fact that an exemption on healthcare workers killed the compromise is nuts. Nurses don't have any proprietary information or knowledge that would harm their former employer * Must be tied to an employment contract--IE no non-competes for at-will employment. Non-competes should be a two-way street, if the employer is going to get the protection of employee retention and IP privacy, the employee should have some protection against being summarily fired (and then unable to get another job)
- fragmede 3y ago
  Nurses don't have proprietary information about the human body at large, but they have proprietary knowledge of the hospitals computer and administrative systems. If you think you own your employees, it's easy to see why they'd want nurses to be subject to non-competes as well.
  - mixdup 3y ago
    >they have proprietary knowledge of the hospitals computer and administrative systems The idea that this is competitive information that would harm the former employer if it walked out the door is absolutely insane. it's more likely than not that any two hospitals will be using the same one of the two or three major EHC systems in the market. At any rate, what system they use, and how it's configured is not something that would or could be used against them in the marketplace
    - vasco 3y ago
      > If you think you own your employees, it's easy to see why they'd want nurses to be subject to non-competes as well. I think this was their biggest point. I don't think they agree with non competes.
      - fragmede 3y ago
        Thank you. I don't personally believe in non-competes, and have the luxury of living somewhere where they're not enforced, but if, as an employer, you believe in non-competes, it's seems obvious that nurses should be just as subject to them as any other field because of their knowledge of the hospitals proprietary systems under that belief system. That's not a general statement on what I believe about non-competes, and the distinction is subtle. Such subtleties are often lost in online discourse.
carterschonwald 3y ago
I’m so disappointed about this.
lsllc 3y ago
Bought and paid for by our corporate masters. More or less the same thing happened to non-competes in MA.
mavelikara 3y ago
Non-Disclosure agreements exist. Employers can prevent an ex-employee from harming them with those. Yet, they insist on non-competes. It is amusing to ask oneself why. I think it is because that employers don’t think that non-disclosures work as well in practice as they do in theory. As in, a person can sign a non-disclosure but if they are allowed to work at a competitors, they may - sometimes without malicious intent - disclose trade secrets that harm the ex-employer. Which is a legitimate concern. These same firms set up complicated corporate structures to prove that “barriers” exist between different parts of their business which prevent collusion and market manipulation. Yet, as the LIBOR manipulation scandal proves, these barriers are toothless when it comes to preventing collusion. I think it is best to state the fears out in the open: * we don’t trust non-disclosures enough, when a person works at a competitor * we don’t trust different departments of the same company not to collude to manipulate markets Etc
- scotty79 3y ago
  The question is if it's a benefit to the society to have those fears placetated. Or maybe a company that managed to lose an employee should be losing control of whatever the employee knows.
  - mavelikara 3y ago
    CA, one can argue, is existence proof that those fears are not beneficial to the society in the aggregate. But my point was something else - what people say, and what they mean are different. Employers roll eyes at the mention of non-disclosures. Citizens roll eyes at barriers that banks swear will prevent any sharing of information between different parts of their business.

370 points by dataflow 3y ago

suby 3y ago

She also (previously) watered down the right to repair bill. She is... not the best. https://www.engadget.com/new-york-right-to-repair-law-kathy-hochul-184654713.html https://www.engadget.com/new-york-right-to-repair-law-kathy-...

asah 3y ago
Watering down is standard for politicians responding to social change. This is the first step.
r00fus 3y ago
There's a reason she almost lost to the extremist Zeldin. She's completely owned by Wall Street.
- kernal 3y ago
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  - NotSammyHagar 3y ago
    Can you share the terrible things that his extremist org has done? I see he supports unpopular and extremists things like 1. abortion rights 2. civil rights 3. keeping the govt working by funding it 4. helping american manufacturing 5. blocking the dictatorship in russia from taking over the small democracy next door.
    - kernal 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - NotSammyHagar 3y ago
        This isn't a serious list, almost all of these are just political talking points with no substance. I will agree the withdrawal from Afghanistan was extremely poorly done. Yes, he was following the treaty trump had negotiated with the other side (was that neg. with terrorists?) but it was poorly done. A lot more soldiers died pointlessly in Iraq and no one saw it as a war crime on Bush2. The us had secret prisons. My country kidnapped people and tortured them in black prisons. That's a crime too. I'd like to prosecute that. The justice dept raided trumps home because he (1) had a long list of secret docs he wasn't supposed to keep (2) he was recorded on his own video call with his own lawyers where he talked about having them, that he shouldn't have them, and he knew they were still top secret because he specifically discussed that he hadn't changed their classification (3) asked him to give them back and he kind of gave a few back (4) asked him again for the things that were in the call and he didn't give them back. Then he asked people working for him to lie about the whole affair. Some of them turned state's evidence. Your points don't stand up to scrutiny. Among other things, ex-presidents are subject to the rule of law.
      - dang 3y ago
        Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. We don't care about which political side you're on but we do care about not having those sorts of comments here. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
    - bigstrat2003 3y ago
      > abortion rights I'm not trying to debate abortion for the millionth time here, but you can't just slip that one in like it's some anodyne proposition that no reasonable person objects to. The fact of the matter is that abortion is still fiercely debated in this country, with its detractors considering it no different from infanticide. So if the Biden administration supports abortion rights, there will be many people who consider that to be a heinous position for him to take.
      - Shekelphile 3y ago
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      - throwup238 3y ago
        > you can't just slip that one in like it's some anodyne proposition that no reasonable person objects to. It's not that no reasonable person can oppose abortion (the objection doesn't even need to be religious in nature), it's that no reasonable person opposes abortion because it's infanticide and opposes all post-natal support policies which is the case in almost all the states that have banned abortion. Hell take a look at the list of states ranked by child mortality and abortion states lead the way by a mile. Welfare and education for mothers and their young children? Rejected. Food stamps? Fuck that. Now there's plenty of debate to be had about the effectiveness and fiscal efficiency of these policies, but anti-abortion states soundly reject the vast majority of them and leave mothers and their children to fend for themselves. Everyone is entitled to their opinion but we don't have to respect their opinions if they are nakedly hypocritical.
- xyzelement 3y ago
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  - monero-xmr 3y ago
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  - o11c 3y ago
    It's not just a word; you can look at his record of attempting to overthrow democracy (regarding January 6). If overthrowing democracy is no longer considered extremist, what is?
    - koolba 3y ago
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      - kevingadd 3y ago
        Accusing Pelosi of conduct equivalent to January 6 is blatantly disingenuous, regardless of your political feelings.
        koolba 3y ago
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        the_gastropod 3y ago
        I don’t recall Pelosi doing that. Have a source?
        koolba 3y ago
        Straight from the horse’s mouth: https://rumble.com/vs7r3v-flashback-pelosi-objects-to-counting-ohio-electoral-votes.html https://rumble.com/vs7r3v-flashback-pelosi-objects-to-counti...
- matrix87 3y ago
  This is the danger of having shitty gop candidates, then the dems can roll with some uninspiring, corrupt, hillaryesque candidate like Hochul and manage to hold onto power. When one party gets shittier, it allows the other one to get shittier as well
  - akira2501 3y ago
    This is the danger of a two party system. They both have an incentive to disenfranchise voters, because our great loophole is that, a "no" vote actually does not count in any meaningful way. So, if you can get 50% to 75% of the eligible population to not vote, then it becomes much easier to maintain power without actually having to take any responsibility for your actions. It should be that if less than 50% of the eligible population turns out, the election is null, and needs to be re-run. We have a right to say "none of the above" and have it stick. The parties need to bear the costs of creating these terrible ballots and candidates that actually appeal to no one.
    - lukevp 3y ago
      Our HOA elections are unable to proceed without a defined quorum, yet the US has no such rules… strange! I think first past the post is a big part of the issue though, and am holding on hope for ranked choice voting to expand
      - Dalewyn 3y ago
        Two things: * Abstention from voting or refusing to vote are a form of political expression. Mandating that everyone must vote is an attack on freedom of speech and expression and will not fly. * Ranked Choice and all the other alternatives often floated run afoul of the most basic criteria: They are complicated. The people either will not or cannot understand and consequently will not tolerate complicated voting schemes. Anything more complicated than "<XYZ> gets my vote." is impractically useless. FPTP remains popular because it is fucking simple enough that anyone can understand it, that it's also generally beneficial to the political parties is merely a side effect.
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LiquidPolymer 3y ago

California has banned noncompete clauses since 1872. It doesn't seem to have killed innovation or destroyed businesses.

jseliger 3y ago
Banning noncompetes is key to California's tech and other industries: https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/2/13/14580874/google-self-driving-noncompetes https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/2/13/14580874/google-self...
- fragmede 3y ago
  Which leads to the question, is this ban in NJ good for California?
  - chaostheory 3y ago
    It is not. The more bans on non-competes spread in the US, the more the SF Bay Area loses one of its main competitive advantages. Silicon Valley would not exist as a tech leader if non-competes were a thing in California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight https://computerhistory.org/stories/spinoff-fairchild/ https://computerhistory.org/stories/spinoff-fairchild/ https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchildren/ https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchild...
    - deleted 3y ago
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    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      I don’t think anywhere in the US has a blanket ban on non competes and protection of an employees’ work like California. https://law.justia.com/codes/california/2010/lab/2870-2872.html https://law.justia.com/codes/california/2010/lab/2870-2872.h... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38746969 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38746969

santoshalper 3y ago

[flagged]

Racing0461 3y ago
There is also no legitimate Conservative Party in the us. Just chamber of commerce representatives like mitt Romney that is happy as long as taxes get cut and dod is funded and cedes all other social ground to democrats.
- TylerE 3y ago
  The US has, by the standard of the rest of the western world, two conservative parties. If you saw what most of the world considers a mildly left centrist, your brain would explode.
  - Racing0461 3y ago
    The US has no conservative party (in economics and culture) sans some guys streaming from their basement with greenscreen on kick and rumble (they got banned from twitch). It's really the battle of who can win (then do the same thing for the billionaires) while virtue signaling to their respective "base" of commoners (both left and right). It's all establishment.
gotoeleven 3y ago
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- edrxty 3y ago
  Tell me about all the illegals that took your job, all the shops of yours that have been lifted and all the drugs you have been dealt.
  - kgwxd 3y ago
    And the list of genders decided by a government. Individuals make that list, not the government. One party understands that, the other claims they can define that list. Which one sounds like Big Government to you?

JoshTriplett 3y ago

> Major business interests, including Wall Street firms This seems like the likely answer. New York has a lot more finance-centric companies than California, and they're going to fight to prevent their employees from being able to go to competing firms.

ajb 3y ago

Discussion from before the veto: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38316870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38316870

seydor 3y ago

> vetoes ban on noncompete That's like, a triple negative

Oarch 3y ago
Had to read the comments to figure out which way this went!

DueDilligence 3y ago

[dead]

tlogan 3y ago

Currently, it’s evident that our political landscape lacks genuine representation for traditional leftist (liberal) or right-wing (conservative) ideologies. Instead, what we’re witnessing are parties primarily aligned with interests of different companies or verticals, overshadowing the core values and concerns of their supposed political spectrums.

cogman10 3y ago
This is what happens when politicians aren't accountable to their constituents. The only people most politicians are accountable to are the big businesses that pay for their campaign finances and super pacs. We desperately need campaign finance reform and strong anti-corruption/bribery laws. After that, voting reform and ranked choice voting would go a long way to making things better.
- bugglebeetle 3y ago
  The Supreme Court has effectively ruled all forms of political bribery to be legal (and engages in it themselves), so good luck with that one.
  - kmeisthax 3y ago
    Not just legal, but constitutionally protected free speech. Effectively "repeal the first amendment or accept legal bribery".
    - soraminazuki 3y ago
      Paying someone is free speech? I didn't realize I was exercising my free speech rights every time I went to the grocery store. What does speech even mean in that context?
      - kmeisthax 3y ago
        Ok, please don't take this comment as a defense of Citizens United and McCutchinson v. FEC, but there is logic to SCOTUS's idea. Imagine for a moment you were, say, a certain Florida governor with Presidential ambitions and an R next to your name. A multibillion dollar mouse cartoon company that runs a local theme park in your state is complaining about a law you passed, and you want them to shut up and fall in line with the party diktat. However, it's unconstitutional to just ban political speech you don't like. So instead you decide to write a bill[0] prohibiting any out-of-state corporation with a certain asset size from spending money in the form of campaign contributions to opposing gubernatorial candidates. Did Florida Man just violate the constitution? If you think so, well, then you believe that money is speech. Or at the very least, that money used to effect political speech (e.g. by lobbying, donating to candidates you want to see elected) should be as protected as speech is. This was actually fairly long-standing SCOTUS precedent, which is probably why they were so willing to tear up campaign finance law. Where SCOTUS goes off the rails in the two cases above is that they then argue that even content-neutral restrictions on moneyspeech are unconstitutional. It's actually fairly well-established doctrine that protests can be regulated - i.e. we're allowed to shift protests at government events (say, the G7) to "free speech zones" that are carefully selected to be as far away from media attention as possible. We're also allowed to have noise laws, even though people use loud megaphones in protests. But we're, apparently, not allowed to have campaign finance laws which are the equivalent of noise laws for talking to your Congressperson. Evidently shouting so loud you speak over everyone else in the room is legal so long as you're speaking with dollars instead of words. [0] This example takes place in an alternate universe where Trump 2000 actually got the man in office, so the culture war brain rot happened earlier than the SCOTUS cases that protected bribery with the 1st Amendment

Scubabear68 3y ago

The LLC transparency stuff drives me nuts. If a company wants LLC guarantees, it should publish who their owners are. It is incredibly frustrating to literally have no idea who is being XYZ LLC. Especially when you have “special purpose vehicle” LLC’s which aren’t really even real companies at all.

Terr_ 3y ago
> a company wants LLC guarantees To wit, getting the government to declare it especially exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities that affect everyone else.
- couchand 3y ago
  > exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities I'm sorry, what are you talking about?
  - Terr_ 3y ago
    https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/limitedliability.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/limitedliability.asp They are ubiquitous today, but at one time each limited liability corporation was individually created by a unique law passed by the legislature, for a specific purpose--often infrastructure projects--and with a fixed lifetime unless renewed again by another law.
    - couchand 3y ago
      Please show me where in that citation is any reference to an LLC being "exempt from the normal responsibilities of debts and liabilities". As the discussion there indicates, limited liability is a totally normal thing, and despite the name it applies to other corporate structures, notably C and S corporations. So what exactly is the "normal" that you claim LLCs deviate from?
      - Scubabear68 3y ago

jorams 3y ago

> ...signed 42 bills late Friday and vetoed another 43, ... of legislation approved by state lawmakers earlier this year. It seems to me something is very broken if half the laws approved by lawmakers are getting vetoed by the governor. Is that normal for states? Does this not lead to an extremely inefficient lawmaking process?

dataflow 3y ago
Unfortunately NY isn't really known for efficient government.
sgift 3y ago
Imho, that laws the legislative has voted on can just be vetoed by someone who is the head of the executive is the main problem. But this mix of executive and legislative seems to be normal in the US, so maybe my unease is just based on what I'm used to over here in Germany. While the President of Germany formally has to accept all laws it's a far less active role. According to the constitution, he's only allowed to not accept a law if he thinks it either was voted on in a process that's forbidden by the constitution or is itself against the constitution. This has happened only nine times since the federal republic exists. edit: The president is also not the head of the executive, just so no one is confused. The chancellor doesn't have any special role in getting a law accepted.
- bombcar 3y ago
  It's a practical acknowledgment of the reality that if the executive branch declines to execute a law, there isn't terribly much that can realistically be done.
- kortilla 3y ago
  The legislative can override the executive by a super majority in the US. It’s a good balance IMO.
  - kmeisthax 3y ago
    And then the executive can null proc the law. The only way to make laws that stick is to include a private right of action so that any enterprising / money-grubbing lawyer can make money enforcing the law you wrote.

cogman10 3y ago

Can anyone here argue why any state should allow noncompete clauses? It seems like something that solely helps business owners and nobody else.

briHass 3y ago
The argument is essentially that a noncompete is a voluntary contract, and generally the courts don't want to prevent individuals from freely entering into agreements. Noncompetes already must have 'consideration', which is typically the employment itself.
edrxty 3y ago
I think it's a case of people only caring about their specific short term individual interests in the narrowest way possible. They're not really a rational thing in any other domain. Basically, if you have a zero sum game with two companies and one has better IP than the other, it makes sense for the time span through which the company without can't reverse engineer it. In every other case it means the groups of companies under the umbrella of non-competes will slowly loose to groups of companies in jurisdictions without non-competes. To expand on that, if you objectively have some special sauce that you don't want leaked to your competition then it's a net gain for you and a loss for the rest of X industry (where X is finance because they're the ones who want this, not tech). In reality though, it's extremely rare to have sole control over an incredibly strong piece of IP that defines a market. In reality, everyone thinks they do because they don't know what anyone else has. Everyone has something that gives them an edge, hence being competitive in the market, but sharing those secrets within their local area can make the whole industry way more performant. The law applies to everyone so if you can't have non-competes, neither can your competition. At a local level it will make groups of companies much stronger than their more distant competitors because they can share knowledge under the table at a much higher rate.
kortilla 3y ago
Things that are good for businesses can be good for society. Trademark laws seem to be useful. Laws against theft seem to be generally nice. Laws against selling company secrets. Contract laws.

ajsnigrutin 3y ago

I understand the need for noncompetes in some areas, but this can be solved differently... In my country (slovenia), if the company wants you to sign a noncompete, they have to decide the length of the noncompete (months, years after you quit) and a monetary compensation has to be written in for the duration of the noncompete. The wording is kinda loose and a few "decided by the court", but this would be an interesting compromise, especially if tweaked a little. So, if you get employed and educated for an eg. rocket scientist, and the company wants you to sign a noncompete, so you could only get a job as a burger flipper, the company would have to pay the difference between what you earn due to a noncompete, and what you'd earn if you continued working the same job (so your previous pay plus inflation + some added percentage as a safety margin).

hippich 3y ago
How does it work in practice? Can company write contract saying compensation for non compete is $1/yr?
- TylerE 3y ago
  What incentive would there be for the employee to sign such an incredibly one sided contract when they could literally go to any other job?
  - JoshTriplett 3y ago
    What incentive is there for the employee to sign a non-compete today that has $0/year compensation for the non-compete duration? However, another comment in this thread suggests that the law in question requires the compensation be the same as that of the job itself, which avoids this issue.
    - tsimionescu 3y ago
      > What incentive is there for the employee to sign a non-compete today that has $0/year compensation for the non-compete duration? If it's the only way to get a job, that's the incentive. If the whole industry does it, or at least the vast majority, then workers don't have an actual choice.

jackfoxy 3y ago

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zmgsabst 3y ago
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- deleted 3y ago
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kmeisthax 3y ago
Dumb question: has anyone tried arguing that a noncompete is a 14A violation?
- 4death4 3y ago
  You're allowed to voluntarily sacrifice your rights in private contracts. E.g. an NDA limits your the 1st amendment rights, but it's not unconstitutional to agree to one.
  - kmeisthax 3y ago
    Yes, but there are limits. 14A specifically calls out indentured servitude as one of the things the Constitution does not tolerate. And 14A is one of the few amendments that actually does tie private hands, unlike the rest of the Constitution.
gen220 3y ago
New York’s history of progressivism is checkered and contradictory, so the real irony is (unfortunately) that this is not ironic, but rather a highly predictable weave in its tapestry. New York might have abolished slavery in 1827, but they also were the only state to perpetuate literal feudalism until a mini civil war prompted a constitutional rewrite in 1846. The sociopolitical history and the scale of intrigue and corruption within New York would rival most countries. The name Empire State is well-earned.

isuckatcoding 3y ago

Vetoes ban non (compete). This triple negative is definitely not confusing.

NoboruWataya 3y ago
How would you write it? It's not like the Governor "didn't not not" do something. Veto, ban, noncompete all have negative connotations but they are very different concepts so don't just cancel each other out like multiple negatives normally would.

jalapenos 3y ago

What I don't get with non-competes is they effectively keep the employee in obligation to the employer, without keeping the reverse. At a minimum, they should have to have paid minimum full-time wage continuously up to the point they attempt to enforce it, for it to be enforceable (in addition to the requirements), and if they haven't when they try to enforce it then it should be treated as a breach of labor laws.

SnowflakeOnIce 3y ago
I believe MA (which overhauled its noncompete laws a few years back) requires "garden leave" in the case of a noncompete — the employer would have to pay the employee's salary for the period of enforcement.
Broken_Hippo 3y ago
Should be a minimum of salary plus benefits plus approximate (or average) bonus. You shouldn't have to pay more for employer-provided health insurance, for example. You should still get any employer contribution to retirement accounts. You should get an approximation of bonuses you would receive if actively working. And so on. If a company thinks you are worth signing a non-compete, they should pay like you are still employed. Non-competes should be a burden for the company to discourage their use.
- jalapenos 3y ago
  I don't think that'd be well aligned. The noncompete obligation is present during employment too, but the work obligation doesn't continue after. So getting full price while you can still work elsewhere (just not anywhere) wouldn't be fair. I still say they should be banned outright for the same reason they originally were at common law -- that they restrain trade, which affects third parties.
  - Broken_Hippo 3y ago
    I'd prefer banning as well, but I figure there are probably some reasonable reasons. And I agree, the work obligation doesn't continue after, but I don't think the employee should lose out on pay while they can't work elsewhere in the same field just because the employer wants to keep them from doing so. It should be painful for the company and easy for the employee.

heads 3y ago

As an example: if Coca Cola’s secret is worth $100 but the employees are making $1 each then a rival can poach them for $10 and still get a great return. Coke could split the $100 more fairly but Pepsi still only needs to pay $100/N + 1 to outbid for the secret. Industries based on secret keeping would, over time, corrupt each other out of business until only a few are left. I can see a how the authorities would argue that this eventual monopoly is bad and look ways to artificially put moats around the secrets. I can also see an argument for this kind of business being allowed to natural cease to exist altogether. Are Wall St secrets different in some way? I suppose for a start we’re talking about sales Rolodexes and client relationships which are much more readily available than cola recipes. In that example the employee’s network is the business value, so why shouldn’t they shop around and take their clients with them? Is there a better analogy to help understand the economics of the situation?

ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
Stealing or receiving stolen trade secrets is a crime on its own. One of the prescribed penalties is disgorgement of 3x the value of the secrets.
- heads 3y ago
  I suppose therefore that the basis of a non-compete agreement is that an employee will be so saturated with secrets that they couldn’t possibly work for a competitor without implicitly revealing those secrets? Garden[ing*] leave is the usual solution to this: the employees are paid a salary to stay at home and do nothing during their notice period. They are cut off from the secrets so that by the end of their employment they no longer pose the threat of a leak. That feels like a fairer deal — are the non competes in NY state a kind that are effectively requiring unpaid gardening leave? That does indeed seem wrong *I always preferred the British version of this where the City gentleman spends the leave period tending to his roses rather than just lounging around on the lawn, hence gardening rather than garden leave.
  - ghaff 3y ago

bigdict 3y ago

Not gonna lie, the triple negative tripped me up.

tchock23 3y ago

I’m not a lawyer, but I don’t see the point of non-competes. Non-solicitation agreements cover not stealing clients or employees after you leave. Non-disclosure agreements cover not sharing non-public information. IP assignment agreements cover assignment of all IP created while being employed. Why do non-competes need to exist given the above CYA mechanisms that companies already have? (Edit: the only exception is noted elsewhere in this thread - if you sell your company to another, you shouldn’t be able to turn around and create a competitor right away, but that’s an edge case)

therealdrag0 3y ago
Good question. I worked at a company that tried to get everyone to sign noncompetes after a high level sales person left and stole clients. Not sure if consolidation didn’t cover it or if they didn’t have that, and if not why they went with non compete instead.
caskstrength 3y ago
> I’m not a lawyer, but I don’t see the point of non-competes. The point obviously is to make it much harder for employees to change jobs and consecutively reduce their wages.

jmyeet 3y ago

Deeply blue states like New York and California don't face a serious threat from Republicans. So what happens? They turn on themselves with sectarian infighting. And there's nothing Democrats in general and New York Democrats in particular hate more progressive candidates. In a district Biden won by 8 in 2020, George Santos was elected in 2022 when Republicans nationally underperformed. And this is a guy who would've been exposed by a $500 background check. Over $100 million was spent to lose to Lindsey Graham by 10 while nothing was spent on Mandela Barnes in Wisconsin who lost by a mere 20,000 votes. I mention all of this as context because Democrats are beholden to the same corporate interests. Their goal isn't to make progressive change. It's not even to win elections. It's really just to fund raise off of how terrible the other side is without the responsibility of having to do anything. My position on noncompetes is a fairly simple one: when you quit, the employer has the option to enforce their noncompete. If they do for whatever the agreed upon period is they pay you 150% of your highest annual total compensation (not just salary) including benefits over the previous 5 years. for that period. Or they can not. It's all or nothing. Failure to pay at any point in that period removes the noncompete from the employer but doesn't discharge the liability. That is, once a noncompete is exercised the employer is on the hook for the entire amount and needs to keep papying on time to keep that noncompete enforced. Does that sound harsh (on the employer)? It's meant to be. Don't want to pay a noncompete? Then don't enforce it.

mixdup 3y ago

Easy compromise on the noncompete front: * Have an income limit below which it doesn't apply * Must be tied to some kind of IP or proprietary knowledge. The fact that an exemption on healthcare workers killed the compromise is nuts. Nurses don't have any proprietary information or knowledge that would harm their former employer * Must be tied to an employment contract--IE no non-competes for at-will employment. Non-competes should be a two-way street, if the employer is going to get the protection of employee retention and IP privacy, the employee should have some protection against being summarily fired (and then unable to get another job)

fragmede 3y ago
Nurses don't have proprietary information about the human body at large, but they have proprietary knowledge of the hospitals computer and administrative systems. If you think you own your employees, it's easy to see why they'd want nurses to be subject to non-competes as well.
- mixdup 3y ago
  >they have proprietary knowledge of the hospitals computer and administrative systems The idea that this is competitive information that would harm the former employer if it walked out the door is absolutely insane. it's more likely than not that any two hospitals will be using the same one of the two or three major EHC systems in the market. At any rate, what system they use, and how it's configured is not something that would or could be used against them in the marketplace
  - vasco 3y ago
    > If you think you own your employees, it's easy to see why they'd want nurses to be subject to non-competes as well. I think this was their biggest point. I don't think they agree with non competes.
    - fragmede 3y ago
      Thank you. I don't personally believe in non-competes, and have the luxury of living somewhere where they're not enforced, but if, as an employer, you believe in non-competes, it's seems obvious that nurses should be just as subject to them as any other field because of their knowledge of the hospitals proprietary systems under that belief system. That's not a general statement on what I believe about non-competes, and the distinction is subtle. Such subtleties are often lost in online discourse.

carterschonwald 3y ago

I’m so disappointed about this.

lsllc 3y ago

Bought and paid for by our corporate masters. More or less the same thing happened to non-competes in MA.

mavelikara 3y ago

Non-Disclosure agreements exist. Employers can prevent an ex-employee from harming them with those. Yet, they insist on non-competes. It is amusing to ask oneself why. I think it is because that employers don’t think that non-disclosures work as well in practice as they do in theory. As in, a person can sign a non-disclosure but if they are allowed to work at a competitors, they may - sometimes without malicious intent - disclose trade secrets that harm the ex-employer. Which is a legitimate concern. These same firms set up complicated corporate structures to prove that “barriers” exist between different parts of their business which prevent collusion and market manipulation. Yet, as the LIBOR manipulation scandal proves, these barriers are toothless when it comes to preventing collusion. I think it is best to state the fears out in the open: * we don’t trust non-disclosures enough, when a person works at a competitor * we don’t trust different departments of the same company not to collude to manipulate markets Etc

scotty79 3y ago
The question is if it's a benefit to the society to have those fears placetated. Or maybe a company that managed to lose an employee should be losing control of whatever the employee knows.
- mavelikara 3y ago
  CA, one can argue, is existence proof that those fears are not beneficial to the society in the aggregate. But my point was something else - what people say, and what they mean are different. Employers roll eyes at the mention of non-disclosures. Citizens roll eyes at barriers that banks swear will prevent any sharing of information between different parts of their business.