Interns’ Job Prospects Constrained by Noncompete Agreements

Re:Interns’ Job Prospects Constrained by Noncompete Agreements by hedora on Saturday June 29, 2019 @08:12PM (#20315641)

I’ve often thought there should be a ratio between transaction value, and the maximum complexity of the contracts involved.

Say 1% is the ceiling. The minimum take home salary of the internship would then be at least 1/0.01=100x the price it would take a lawyer to review and negotiate the employment contract.

Say it takes a lawyer a conservative 5 hours, at a Bay Area lowball of $250/hour. The internship must therefore pay at minimum $125,000 after tax, or terms benefiting the employer (and only those) are unenforceable.

This would be applicable retroactively even when people choose to sign without reading.

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Re:Interns’ Job Prospects Constrained by Noncompete Agreements by hedora on Saturday June 29, 2019 @08:30PM (#20315688)

Alternatively, the author of said contract could, by law, be forced to pay for the other party’s lawyer.

That seems simpler, but I think it is more easily abused by consumers. (Get a overpriced slimey lawyer, apply for 100 credit cards, and split the fee with the lawyer after the fact).

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Re:Interns’ Job Prospects Constrained by Noncompete Agreements by geofft on Saturday June 29, 2019 @11:54PM (#20316233)

Is there an existing solution in the court system when you're forced to pay the other side's attorneys' fees, to make sure those fees are reasonable?

My uninformed suggestion is to set a statutory rate for contract review, allowing the legislature to revise it every few years, and perhaps tying it to some other government budget or salary in some way (e.g., some multiple of the effective hourly rate of government attorneys or clerks, or some fraction of the government's maximum allowed rate on their own contract review).

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