Employers in many industries use non-compete agreements as a key
tool to protect trade secrets. According to U.S. Treasury reports,
non-compete agreements impact approximately 30 million –
nearly one in five – U.S. workers, including roughly one in
six workers without a college degree.
Some employers have imposed non-compete agreements across a
broad segment of their workforce, including imposing them on
low-wage earning employees and employees who are not privy to trade
secrets or other confidential information. Non-compete agreement
opponents argue that such broad non-compete agreements can
interfere with the employee's right to make a living without
any off-setting benefit for the employer. In the past few years,
state attorneys general have been successfully suing companies to
invalidate what many see as overly-expansive non-compete
agreements.
