New York’s governor vetoed a bill days before Christmas that would have banned noncompete agreements, which restrict workers’ ability to leave their job for a role with a rival business.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, who said she tried to work with the Legislature on a “reasonable compromise” this year, called the bill “a one-size-fits-all-approach” for New York companies legitimately trying to retain top talent.
“I continue to recognize the urgent need to restrict non-compete agreements for middle-class and low-wage workers, and am open to future legislation that achieves the right balance,” she wrote in a veto letter released Saturday.
The veto is a blow to labor groups, who have long argued that the agreements hurt workers and stifle economic growth. The Federal Trade Commission had also sent a letter to Hochul in November, urging her to sign the bill and saying that the agreements can harm innovation and prevent new businesses from forming in the state.
Sure, ban non-competes, but remember that you can’t just go using your rival’s secrets at their competitors. Additionally, if your current company heavily paid to have you educated, it seems fair that you might need to sign some form of agreement where the cost of that education is a debt that slowly vests away with your tenure at the firm.
The line between that and indentured servitude is real fuckin’ slim.
Paying for an employee’s education with a condition that they must remain with the company for a certain period of time or repay the funds is not the same as indentured servitude. This arrangement is typically known as a “tuition reimbursement” or “employee education assistance” program.
Indentured servitude historically referred to a labor system where individuals were bound to work for a specific period of time to pay off a debt or obligation, often without freedom of movement or significant personal rights. It was a form of unfree labor.
On the other hand, tuition reimbursement programs in modern employment are voluntary agreements. Employees choose to accept the benefit under certain conditions, such as staying with the company for a set period. Failure to meet these conditions usually requires repayment of the benefits received, but does not involve any loss of personal freedom or rights. These programs are designed to encourage professional development and employee retention, and are regulated by labor laws to ensure fairness and consent.
Debt as a concept is trivially easy to abuse. You give someone a month of training and say, yep, that’ll be a year’s salary. Don’t leave or we’ll repossess your car.
Indentured servitude was also voluntary. Nobody got pressganged into it. It was not technically slavery. You’d get an exciting new opportunity in the colonies, or a job at the mine with equipment helpfully provided, and ten years later you might earn enough to be broke.
Since labor laws evidently don’t prevent a contract from saying “you can’t work for anyone else in the industry you work in,” I’m skeptical that existing regulations on this process are sufficient. Maybe late capitalism hasn’t twisted it hard enough to notice. Certainly it is a recent development that fuckin’ Jimmy John’s tried pushing non-compete agreements to flip burgers.
Don’t sign a contract that you don’t like…
Victim-blaming chickenshit attitude.
How is someone that enters into an agreement on their own accord a victim? That makes no logical sense.
Then why limit non-compete agreements? Or any agreements?
Rent paperwork says I own your firstborn. Don’t like it, don’t sign it.
We are fucking clearly talking about abusive extremes, from which business must be forced to back down, or else they’ll let that creep onto everyone and everything. When it becomes a matter of “agree to this or starve,” agreement is not an excuse.
That is not exactly how it works. There are some legal protections to help with this. If a contract is grossly unfair or one-sided, it might be considered “unconscionable” and therefore unenforceable. This usually happens when one party has significantly more power or information than the other, leading to an abuse of that power. Courts may also refuse to enforce contracts that were entered into under duress, undue influence, or fraud.