Legal director Sandeep Vaheesan urges on the much needed proposal by the FTC to ban non-compete clauses across all US industries.

On January 5, the Federal Trade Commission announced a policy initiative that could be a major boon for labor. It proposed to ban non-compete clauses for all workers—no exceptions. These contracts bind tens of millions of workers today across nearly all occupations. The FTC estimated its proposed prohibition could increase workers’ collective earnings by as much as $300 billion per year.

The FTC’s proposal did not come easily or quickly. In March 2019, a broad public interest and labor coalition, led by the Open Markets Institute (where I work) and included the AFL-CIO, Public Citizen, and SEIU, petitioned for this rule—a petition lauded by two of the Democrats on the four-member Commission in their statement supporting the FTC’s proposal. Since the submission of our petition, we repeatedly urged the FTC to initiate action. President Joe Biden gave the effort a big boost when he encouraged the FTC to regulate non-compete clauses in a July 2021 executive order.

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