Ted Rall for July 19, 2021

There are very good reasons for SOME non-compete clauses. But I do think that it’s far too easy for giant corporations to simply threaten using this tool. Perhaps a non-compete clause should only be allowed after a panel of judges says it’s okay in this particular case. Or some such thing.

Last panel. Join the club, we meet on Tuesdays. We have to find a new bar to meet at. The latest one kicked us out for disparaging the wait staff, food and temperature of the beer.

Legal only in America. In other countries its against constitution to relinquesh your freedoms and rights, like right to work.

Good for you, Ted! Thank you for standing up for your rights.

A modern form of slavery.For comparison, this is the law in Germany:- no blanket agreements allowed- always limited to max. two years- the “workers” (usually: high ranking managers/executives) receive compensation during that time (approx. half the money they would have earned, if the they had stayed in the firm)- there has to be a good reason for the non-compete clause like special knowledge (this can be checked by a court of law; the are usually worker-friendly)

Corporations have slowly gone out of control since around 1970.

Anger at personal injustice is often the beginning of a process like transforming iron ore into steel. Words can become weapons, through writers as blacksmiths.

Woman left the company for another company doing the same thing. My company sued her on the non compete and lost. They never bothered to try that again. Sorry to hear that Ted. I don’t always agree with you, but no one should get screwed like that!

NDAs are pretty much unenforceable. You have to be able to earn a living, and most judges will not rule the NDA enforceable unless you take proprietary secrets/methods to your new place.

My old boss successfully fought an NDA when he was, well, fired for some reason I do not remember. (He really was an A-hole, though.) He immediately got a job with a direct competitor and our company took him to court. I should add that our company had created a textile that was unique at the time and we held the patent on the manufacturing process for years. Good times. But all along there were others who were trying to develop their own versions of the textile, and my ex-boss got a job with one of them.

Upshot, the courts would not uphold the DNA because a person needs to be able to earn a living. Did “Jim” use his knowledge of the textile in his new job? You betcha! Now that textile is so ubiquitous, pretty much everyone reading this has at least one garment in the closet made of this textile.

yep

I see lots of folks agreeing with Ted. Same here.

He’s probably not allowed to post this, but I will:

https://www.patreon.com/tedrall#no_universal_links

This another one of those “freedoms” that Americans crow about?

Hoo-ah! Theodore does two good strips in a row!

When my IT job was phased out in 2010, they wanted me to sign something similar. Fortunately I saw the writing on the wall and had another job lined up when they terminated my employment. Anywho, I looked the HR manager and said, “This basically says I can’t take another job in IT…But I have taken a new job already and start in three weeks. I can’t believe you expect me to sign this.” The HR manager said something similar about it being the boilerplate termination of employment documentation. I refused and she said I had to sign it. I asked, “If I don’t what will you do? Fire me?”

I had a job once that required me to not work in a similar field for a period of three years. I was told by the state’s employment security people that that company policy was illegal and unenforceable.

And yet Apple, Google, Tesla, and other tech giants in Silicon Valley routinely trade managers and engineering staff.

Well, at least that offers some insight as to why Ted is mad at the world.

Corporate slavery: “We own your ass!”

Fully agree with Mr. Rall, and have experienced some of his pain. HR has tried to get me to sign noncompete contracts, as well as trying to get me to deed any and all patentable ideas over to them (even when no company resources or time were involved). I just refuse to sigh, and after many attempts HR usually gives up. When they make veiled threats to coerce me to sign, I respond with less veiled threats – including pointing out they can’t enforce a non-compete if they fire me, and I WILL go straight to their competitors if they do fire me…

You have my sympathies on this one. I was almost forced into leaving a firm (by a small set of people who were apparently threatened and had political influence), and I played the political game well enough to leave on my own terms — to the top competitor. Suddenly the people that tried to pretend I wasn’t all that useful wanted me to sign a quarter-inch-thick nondisclosure and noncompete agreement. Um, no. You ask people to sign that BEFORE they join, not after. And they didn’t. And I didn’t. They threatened the firm I went to with a lawsuit, and our lawyers told me that they just laughed and ignored it.

The good news is that I hear from more and more experts that noncompetes are unenforceable, but they shouldn’t be allowed in the first place.

There is a trick you can sometimes pull off: just draw a line through it (initialing the deletion) and then sign it. If they don’t pay attention, it’s legal as you modified it.

I’m trying to corner the market on Mocking.

Good for you, Ted. They wanted you to sell your soul for a pittance. I know you get disparaged a lot in the comments but I consider you a wise and fair man.

Next entry, when Ted got fired for no reason other than that his boss was in a bad mood, and they were in a state where he didn’t have to give a reason. America!

I wonder if taking your services to a foreign competitor, as Rall did with the news website platform Sputnik International established by the Russian government-owned news agency Rossiya Segodnya, would violate a non-compete clause.

Company I worked for gave me ONE dollar for the rights to anything I might invent or improve and I’m guessing that is in effect till I die.

Among Ted’s best strips.

“Disparagement is one of my favorite things” would not, I think. scan properly in the “Sound of Music” song. (—