I posted this above, but it applies here too: Non-competes allow employees to get training they otherwise would not get.
A non-compete allows a company to make an investment in you (in the form of training) with some assurance that you will not immediately turn around post-training and go work for a direct competitor. NDAs/IP assignment agreements do not address this need. If it weren't for non-competes, that investment would be infeasible and we would all be paying our employers for the training we get – either directly, in the form of course fees, or indirectly, in the form of depressed wages during the course of the training.
Non-competes allow employees to get training they otherwise would not get.
A non-compete allows a company to make an investment in you (in the form of training) with some assurance that you will not immediately turn around post-training and go work for a direct competitor. NDAs/IP assignment agreements do not address this need. If it weren't for non-competes, that investment would be infeasible and we would all be paying our employers for the training we get – either directly, in the form of course fees, or indirectly, in the form of depressed wages during the course of the training.
A non-compete allows a company to make an investment in you (in the form of training) with some assurance that you will not immediately turn around post-training and go work for a direct competitor. NDAs/IP assignment agreements do not address this need. If it weren't for non-competes, that investment would be infeasible and we would all be paying our employers for the training we get – either directly, in the form of course fees, or indirectly, in the form of depressed wages during the course of the training.
For a deeper dive on this, see Paul H. Rubin and Peter Shedd, "Human Capital and Covenants Not to Compete," available at https://www.jstor.org/stable/724227?seq=1#page_scan_tab_cont....