We are currently repeating living in "the economy of the Gilded Age". I started my career in corporate America in the late 1970's at a well run, Fortune 500 company with a supportive boss & mentor-specializing in employee & executive compensation. Attended many conferences where I saw you speak Mr. Reich. My company paid for my MBA, provided expanded growth & development into other areas of expertise & was paid a good salary with great benefits. I started my executive career here & moved to other companies & industries. I was very lucky to have had my career during the next 20 years. I continued at an an executive level and saw concerning changes in the corporate world over the mid 1980's-2000's. Something was happening to destroy the working world & only in recent years have I understood what happened. I hope the FTC is successful in defeating the NCA's.
I do not recognize the world we live and work in today at all. We are in a sad state in our country & our younger generations are struggling to survive, as well as so many other people. I hope some miracle changes our political system to where those elected serve those they are elected to represent. Our democracy is hanging by a thread ! Thank you for your hard work in sharing your thoughts with so many people- there is hope for change.
The MBAs above all else have learned to maximise their compensation above all else. For example, made health care professionals lives miserable with endless reporting, graphing, meetings, etc as if patients were toyota cars. Insurance clerks rob countless hours of physicians and nurses time refusing to allow life saving meds. The system is designed to wear down the providerscand tjevinsureds. Unpaid claims are profit.
The same with educators. we have always kept records on student progress, but the mania in the 80s for data for datas sake is killing for the relationships that teachers build with students, families and collegues. I still hear from my students, I was a principal and teacher, I though I am 75 and retired 7 years ago. The students want me to know how they are doing with family, friends and their passions. They are joining my Rotary. I love my life but am saddened by those who are selfish and self centered.
My adolescent years took place in the hometown of James Stewart, the movie actor, population 40K including environs. In the 1960s, I attended the public junior high and senior high schools there. Relations between students and teachers resembled a Saturday Evening Post cover by Norman Rockwell. My buddy and I would take our girlfriends on a Saturday night double date to the movies, deliver the girls home by 10:30 pm, and then visit one of our high-school teachers, who was reliably watching a late-night TV movie. Discussion ensued, and much wisdom was passed down in those late-night conversations. I cannot imagine a scenario like that today.
Michael, I like your perspective here. I do believe the "suits" want to make life nearly impossible for the actual workers like nurses, doctors, and other healthcare providers and to make things difficult for average Americans. I do believe you are right about the way profits are accumulated. I do believe also that is why we need a rethink related to insurance. Universal Health Care would mostly take care of the medical insurance part, but the rest, it is unclear. When "the bottom line" and the profits accumulated are the only things that matter to a business, that is unhealthy for everyone. I think the stock market has helped a lot with that, but business owners and corporate CEOs have contributed their fair share. The FTC's plan to end Non Compete Agreements could go a long way to begin the process of stopping some of the corporate bad behavior and dismissal of the value of workers.
No chance of universal health care until the crazy burn-it-down GQP no longer has control of the house. They want to defund the IRS (because their mega-rich donors told them to do that) and are eager to cut Social Security and Medicare. Nice folks, huh?
True enough. But states can do amazing things for their citizens. In Massachusetts we had a non-binding ballot initiative last November.
"Shall the Representative from this District be instructed to vote for legislation to create a single payer system of universal health care that provides all Massachusetts residents with comprehensive health care coverage including the freedom to choose doctors and other health care professionals, facilities, and services, and eliminates the role of insurance companies in health care by creating an insurance trust fund that is publicly administered?”
Watch our state on this subject. And...we now we have Maura Healey as Governor. We could be the lab for progressive policies that actually help people.
At least this was brought up to a vote for the people to decide, and NOT the corporate paid "puppets", I mean politicians. Only issue I see with this is the word "instructed" probably should have been replaced by "required". Words matter.
yeah, but take heed of the rare moment of sunlight into "how the sausage is made in Congress"! The GQP exposed it's an entirely "top-down" institution: no speaker, no House Session, period. The GQP exposed how it's a kabuki echo chamber for money: the speaker decides "the agenda" raises money from corporations to fix the agenda, then uses that same money to select appropriate candidates in the primaries, all dressed up as "democracy". The GQP exposed that each bill that passes the House, passes under different rules, decided by the "Rules committee" in deference to aforementioned speaker's agenda: so like NFL referees deciding "the game isn't over yet" if they don't like the score, they can "keep the vote open" and countless other shenanigans. Each bill, different treatment. Who would have given us such insight? Not the MSM! We gotta USE this knowledge and press the Speaker.
This part is so sad “When "the bottom line" and the profits accumulated are the only things that matter to a business, that is unhealthy for everyone.” Our country, our people cannot rely on “the kindness of” corporations.
"Kindness of corporations"? If that ever existed, it was a very long time ago. Now, they "hide" their true intentions by doing things such as "free bagels" on Fridays, but no longer an annual "cost of living" adjustment to cover inflation. Your wage raise now will cover that they say, if you are lucky. They may give you a "bonus" at the end of the year, but this is NOT guaranteed and because it is NOT in your base salary, ANY percentage of wage increase will NOT include that "bonus" part of your compensation. Little torpedoes aimed at your financial well-being. But do NOT forget, you are getting the "free bagels".
Look at the NYC nurses's strike. They are sick of patients being treated like objects.
Back when CEOs of hospitals were mostly doctors, patients were treated like humans. When healthcare "systems" bought hospitals and replaced the C-suite with MBAs, CFOs, and other non-clinical types, patients became widgets on an assembly line.
Small (unprofitable) community hospitals closed. Folks then had to travel significant distances to find healthcare and those with life-threatening illness/ injury burn valuable Golden Hour minutes in transport.
Those who provide direct care - nurses, aides, phlebotomists, X-ray techs, lab techs, and others - are run ragged. They care for increasingly ill patients and larger numbers of patients. When someone calls off, staffing is so lean there is no one to cover. Not uncommon when one has worked a 12 hour shift that that they are asked to stay over. It's not safe! Nurses skip breaks, and most often, meals. A bathroom break is a luxury many go without.
The quality of care is reduced as healthcare workers have to rush from patient to patient. Task to task. Financially, it looks great on the bottom line with fewer bodies doing the work, but patients are missing out on the other essentials that direct care staff provides: listening to concerns; caring, compassion, reassurance; patient education; advocating. It is cruel to deprive patients of this and cruel to nurses who go into nursing to make a difference.
Cheryl, what an excellent summary of what so many nurses experience. Then, the patients suffer, but for the hospitals, doctors who depend on the quantity of tests and procedures performed make out because ordering all kinds of tests makes up for paying attention to patients' needs and asking good questions of patients to get a sense of what is going on. Those things bring in the bucks, giving good care supposedly does not. We need universal healthcare and opportunities for more people to become nurses and other medical personnel. We need talented people, but perhaps we could find ways to help with college costs and develop tests that don't actually find out the knowledge and quality of the person wanting to become a nurse. Perhaps, the MCATs don't really indicate the quality of the person who wants to become a doctor either. It seems to me it works to get more rich white folks in medical schools while people of other groups are discarded because testing is not their gift or their financial possibility for training for the tests. I suspect the hospital administrators, those in charge of the bottom line don't want that either because people might expect them to actually hire more medical staff of all kinds. Can't have that!
So true. Some docs order a whole bunch of (billable) tests because it takes TIME to do an assessment and the healthcare systems that own their practices want them to see MORE PATIENTS PER HOUR.
MCATs show who is smart, but doesn't show who has a caring heart.
All those who don't do the actual front line work have to find ways to justify their own jobs, often at the expense of those who are doing the front line work. You see that in many professions. Perhaps we don't need so many layers of management?
I have high hopes for the future, as the ancient _rumplican dinosaurs die out and our youth become more PROGRESSive each generation. It's only a matter of time now.
We don't have much "time." The earth and all its life is dying. If humanity doesn't straighten out and step up to the plate to save not only itself but other life, the time won't matter.
Unfortunately, fundamentalist religion persists in the USA and is being promulgated amongst youth. Religious fundamentalism ”always” neglects the need for economic equality because churches are typically funded by people who have lots of money gathered by a successful career in capitalism. A point of example is the situation at the US Air Force Academy, which has, of course, a chapel on campus. Despite the Sunday services offered at the base chapel, many students at the academy choose to be bussed — and are permitted to be bussed — to an off-campus Christian mega-church that is fundamentalist in nature and fuses patriotism with religiosity: God wants the USA to win. The result is an Air Force officer corps drenched in a Christian fundamentalist world view. The familiar New Testament phrase “The poor will always be with us” indicates to the fundamentalist that gross economic inequality is God’s plan, and that the officer corps somehow deserves more than the common GI. This no surprise. Inequality in the military has always existed; however, it’s disturbing that in the 21st century, the US Air Force tacitly encourages its religious underpinning.
Organized religion has caused grief since forever. Patriarchy, racism, wars, predatory behavior, greed, child abuse, pedophilia and giving people the sense of superiority with the right to judge.
That miracle would be voters figuring out which party has been killing the middle class for the last 40 years. Although it is completely obvious which party that is, when half the population lives in a disinformation bubble they can't break out of the odds of that miracle happening seem remote.
Ms. Corona, you began your career working for people who respected you and your skills and knowledge. They valued you and seemed to care about you as a person and also about your future in work. I don't know of many companies today who would either conduct training in-house or send their employees to school. Then again, I am retired and haven't had much contact with the world of employment. Your situation looks like one in which the employer and employee bargained together to create a good deal for both. Companies don't seem to have that attitude today.
Though I am a great believer in "freedom" and the right of the individual to chart a life and make own choices, I also think that human enterprise needs some governing. After all, what we perceive rarely goes beyond what we experience and what we need or want.
Never agree to sign a NCA it. All the knowledge you have gatthered working in a particular industry, is your main asset when looking for another job. Your knowledge is valuable for the new party. It happened to me when I applied for a transfer within the Company to an attractive central location for my frequent travelling. Rather than flying for 14 hours to reach the region I was responsible for, the maximum time from that location was under 3 hours and I could spend the weekends at home. It was refused 3 times.
Then luckily I was approached by a headhunter for a top job, directly reporting to the board of directors of a major industry, though it would involve possible more travelling all over the world.
Nevertheless I filed my request for the 4th time and I informed my Co that a "no" would mean I would be leaving.
Is it in the same industry?
I confirmed.
They responded that the NCA would not allow me to take that job.
I requested them to show the agreement I had signed. No NCA was mentioned.
Within three months I landed at my new preferred location where I worked for the next 17 years.
OFF TOPIC: Does anyone else think there's something remarkably fishy about the >timing< of documents marked as classified miraculously appearing in Biden's possession, from the time he was VP? Just remarkin'.
Surrendered via the appropriate channels, and ........... were NOT found in somebody's personal desk.... What I want to know is how - in either situation any classified doc can get out of any building it's not supposed to leave in the first place! Every time I hear an "expert" describe the way these documents are supposed to be handled it SOUNDS like extremely tight security and monitoring. Of course, in tfg's situation, it's not hard to imagine threats, coverups, etc.... Just hoping DOJ / J.S. are looking at this as well..
One wonders if they got there via Mar-a-Lago. Remember. Not all >those< documents have been accounted for. Since - presumably - anyone who checks them out is >supposed to< sign for them, it should've been no trick at all to look up documents Biden might've checked out and snag them with the rest - just in case. An "insurance" policy. Total speculation, to be sure . . . . . . . . yet,
shoulda been the case re mar a lago too.... and in THAT case, I've been thinking "inside job", just like many other extremely questionable activities associated with tfg.
When they were discovered, Biden should've recognized whether he had taken them or not. But it also could be that his memory was fuzzy, & he just didn't question whether he had or not.
He says unaware any such documents were taken to that office, in the first place - not "I don't remember."
(I suspect dirty tricks even more, now - a classic "Mission Impossible" stunt. They didn't assassinate politicians outright. They'd place them in an awkward situation about which they knew nothing until they were busted or killed by their own people.)
Or it was a dirty trick that went wrong when Biden's lawyers found and returned them. I want to see them establish that Biden's fingerprints are on the document and >he< put them where they were found. My other comment explains.
According to this, Biden's lawyers found the documents while cleaning out his think tank office, reported, and returned them immediately in November: https://youtu.be/xH4Bsrpg3ik The news is only reporting about it now. Timing's still fishy. Someone else suggests an attempt to hijack and control the narrative. I'm inclined to agree.
DZK, you noted that too? I still don't understand why it was even reported at all since the documents appear to have no real significance. It is just another way our media has to present conflict where there is none and try to distract people from the real crimes that Donald Trump committed. It is disgraceful, but not unexpected.
They were labeled SCI. "A subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances." Bottom line Biden didn't know they were there. They were returned to the Archives by his lawyers immediately. No obstruction, no fraud!
It’s impossible, of course, but I’d like to know the kind of info that’s SCI. For example, is the number of restrooms in the Pentagon an example of SCI? We might be surprised by the trivial nature of much “Secret” information.
Yes, absolutely, I had the same thoughts. Why now. Obviously one of the new and many distractions from all the corruption of the orange con administration. Not to mention 147 Republican Congress people voted against certifying Biden as the President. I believe Revenge is on the plate for the next two years. Oh and ongoing insurrections and coverups. Their moto is “Bury The Truth.”
Scott, isn't it interesting that it is the criminals, the insurrectionists who are launching investigations of the documents found at Biden's office, Garland who has not yet done anything to indict any of them, and any Democrat in office they just don't like? They can't govern, but they are pretty good at revenge, revenge for the American people knowing those insurrectionists have betrayed their oaths to uphold and defend our Constitution. None of this will go anywhere and will just waste time, but maybe that's a good thing. It might keep them from having time to attempt any of the harm they want to inflict on the American people.
I think it was an "oops" that was honestly dealt with. Now, if more and more boxes start coming forward, that would be different. They're just going to pick at everything they can. It's pitiful.
Perhaps. But one still wonders how it came to be discovered just as the House speaker - leveraged by the Q-wankers - is finally seated. That's the story that interests me.
Not necessarily. I assume it was forgotten. When investigators were searching Trump's residence for classified government documents, that should've made Biden (or Obama) think about whether there were any such documents that they had taken that might still be lying around somewhere. But it is common for people of Biden's age to forget, so I think it's an innocent case of forgetting about a few documents that they may have taken out to review & never got around to returning.
Or, Jaime, there were so few they could just have accidentally gotten mixed with other things. There is nothing to connect these two situations, but the media in their desperate quest for some kind of balance and Republican desperate need to protect their child-man Trump, this minor mistake is being equated with Trump's theft and hiding of many many top secret documents. How sad our media thinks this is worthy of more than a 10 second note.
But now they've found more in another location. Biden says he doesn't remember them. Highly possible he took them & forgot about them, or even may be lying.
But perhaps, as DJK has suggested, they were part of the not yet accounted for bunch of documents that Trump took & were planted there, assuming that it was accessible to someone with such a motive. Would Trump have taken & kept a key that goes to those rooms? We know that if Trump & his associates could, they would have, as nothing is beneath them.
See my other responses to you. I still think the announcement timing is fishy. It distracts attention from the rules package the Q Front just imposed on the House.
According to the clip, Biden's own lawyers found them, reported them, and turned them in back in November. It's old news that nobody seems to have known about until now. The timing of the news release is >still< fishy!
Just remember: we've been living in a post-fact political environment for a number of years. ol' Tweety's already started calling for FBI "raids" on even the WH. Whatever the facts may be, you can bet that the Ouisling Front - they put the "Q" in Quisling - will be all over it. Strap in!
DZK, yep, the crazies have to claim these events are the same when clearly they are not. Trump deliberately stole documents and refused to return them. I suspect he intended to use them for his own benefit, although that will be hard to prove unless someone comes forward who received information from those documents after Trump left office. We don't know about the specific papers at the Biden office, but they were reported to be "confidential." They haven't mentioned any "top Secret" documents as were in the Trump stolen lot. The media just must have a controversy and will push it hard as they did with Ben Gazi, emails, and so many other non-issues in the past couple of decades, while missing what was really going on.
If companies compensated fairly, offered good benes, honored reasonable requests to do things like Peter describes, encouraged / aided in the development of skills required to advance, and overall treated them as valued, trusted employees, perhaps most would NOT be enticed to leave for competing companies...
Peter, good for you, checking to see if there actually WAS an NCA. Maybe that is something all employees should check out and find out what to do legally if they can break it, then if unhappy, move on. This is the time to do that.
yeah, but the saying used to be that NDAs raise salaries or golden parachutes for those jobs that require them. To compensate for the loss of economic freedom. True or False?
Yes this is great news, if it is enacted and funded. But good ol' boy Mitch McConnell and his lackey the trumpster, have managed to pack most of the Federal court and worst of all the Supreme Court against the Constitution and the people it tries to serve. From 2003 until 2021 when I left government and went into the private sector I was faced with these non-competes. With small companies I managed to face them down and refuse to sign, but no such luck with the two corporations for whom I worked, but even there I managed to weasel out if they lost their contract, I was able to work for a different company on the grounds I didn't lose the contract they did. But then I was already in my 70's and 80's, with knowledge and experience they needed and willing to travel anywhere on 24 hours notice. My younger coworkers, especially those of both genders who had a family, were not so fortunate and they had to do the bow and scrape to stay employed. I hope this is a win, for all those coworkers, they render a great service to the business world.
When I practiced law, non-competes were valid only if there was "a separate binding consideration." According to the FTC, "Because non-compete clauses prevent workers from leaving jobs and decrease competition for workers, they lower wages for both workers who are subject to them as well as workers who are not." If there is a legally binding consideration, I can understand why an exception should exist on a legitimate basis.
Thanks for these excellent links Daniel. I have never understood where non-compete laws came from or why they could even exist. It seems absurd to me that (in my limited experience) why a hairdresser could not work for 6 months (or more) after wanting to leave a business and then had to work a certain distance from the business they were leaving,. Lower wage workers...what the hell? Of course Biden is right to try and do away with this, good grief, but the ruling class has more power and I predict this will not stand. My daughter, as I write this, is striking against Mt. Sinai Hospital....we are certainly living in different times, corporate healthcare is ruthless today. A major concession they want is to be adequately staffed to properly and safely administer care to patients. I know that one nurse has worked a 12 hour shift alone on a unit. Would you want to be in a desperately ill patient and want THAT overtired, overworked nurse taking care of YOU? Yesterday, corporate offered more money BUT wouldn't address staffing...strike stays on. Workers are really screwed in this country,...American life is becoming very depressing.
Most hairdressers are not "employees" rather "independent contractors." Your daughter is an employee in a union state. I live in an "at will" state. Employees have virtually no rights, can be fired "at will" unless a federal statute like the NLRB protects them.
Good info Daniel. And excellent point about Kushner, Mnuchin and so many others who reap in mega dollars from people they previously regulated. The Rs frequently cross that line.
Daniel, as always, thanks so much for the information. I agree what there are certain legal things that should keep a person moving to another company, but those should be few and not meant as a crippler of workers. I have my fingers crossed that this will work out.
There's a similar type of agreement, or clause, I've seen in employment contracts that declares anything you invent, or otherwise personal intellectual property belong to the employer. Are you familiar with that" (Is there an acronym for it?) I wonder if that's addressed in proposed FTC rule.
My husband worked for a company that produced, among other things, hoses and fittings for hydraulic applications. Anything that an employee devised to improve products or processes became the property of the company.
An old friend of mine was an engineer with General Motors back in the 50s through the 80s and he invented the electric door lock. But the patent belonged to General Motors because of the same thing you were talking about. He got a nice Commendation to hang on his wall about the invention. whoopee.
Yes, my grandfather, an immigrant from the Austrian province of Slovenia, designed the offset-handle metal-wood shovel that we’re all familiar with as produced by the Heppenstahll Company in Pittsburgh in the early 20th century. As a humble tool-and-die-maker, he never got a dime from the patent, of course.
Years ago my uncle worked at Raytheon. He developed several parts that improved the way machinery worked. Needless to say, such improvements were the company’s intellectual property.
Of course they were. Did your uncle at least receive bonuses for his inventions? Some industries have been successfully sued for taking employees inventions with no compensation. If your uncle is still alive he should contact ACLU about this. I hope he kept proof, drawings, letters, thank you notes.
Yes, I am. when I worked for IBM I signed such a contract, It didn't really matter to me, since I am not an 'inventor'. One of my coworkers was and held more than 200 patents, however he was quite contented because although his patents were transferred to IBM he said they paid him well for his work and he received bonuses each time he filed another patent. Some of my intellectual work (Power Point slides) I willingly gave to my manager as they were mostly for training coworkers and I considered that part of my job. However other companies are not so generous and decent, I have hear horror stories of people spending hours of their own time, offsite, inventing things to improve a product an the company taking the idea, making millions of dollars from it and when asked for a bonus fired the inventor instead.
Just like how Nikola Tesla had his inventions stolen from him by Westinghouse corporation. They went after him and hit him with everything but the kitchen sink. He invented Quite a few things and in the end died penniless.When you get on the wrong end of a corporation and they have millions to spend you’re pretty well cooked. Edison did the same thing.He bad mouthed Teslas alternating current, he even had an elephant electrocuted to death to show how dangerous it was. What a joke.
Thank you for remembering Tesla, as you said a brilliant man with three strikes against him, honesty, genius and he was a (gulp) foreigner. Put that against good ol' Corporate America and he didn't stand a chance.
Fay, I hope this turns out to be a win too. We have certainly permitted corporations/businesses all kinds of freedoms they/we have not given to the workers who keep those businesses alive and moving. That just doesn't seem fair. Protect the rich, leave the workers with only what employers decide they want to pay. Not OK!
Jan 10, 2023·edited Jan 10, 2023Liked by Robert Reich
"This is a big deal. The FTC estimates that such a ban could increase wages by nearly $300 billion a year (about $2,000 per worker, on average) by allowing workers to pursue better job opportunities."
Wow. That should be highlighted. I had no idea it would make that much of a difference.
I had already noted coverage of this new rule. And you are correct in pointing out its significance. Also noted is your inclusion of words such as monopoly and robber-barons. All of these are very significant topics that are way overdue for reconsideration. So a salute and a thank you.
This should be a much bigger story nationwide so the GOP can't gut it without workers noticing. But now that I"m avoiding twitter I''m not able to RT these kinds of issues and articles as much as I used to. sigh.
I don't think that would matter. They, the r, would hear a twisted story of why it is not good on the faux news stations they listen to. They would never know that there was a good reason for having this.
It is infuriating that they are able to puke the mostly fictional stories that they do. There should really need to be a notice to the viewer that comes across each episode that says they are under no obligation to tell the truth, "for entertainment only" - like the commercials for psychic networks had to.
Non-competes are a joke. Guess how quickly a company will toss a worker if that salary will help make somebody’s bonus. Pretty quickly if there are no worries about taking that talent to a competitor. And yes, there are non-competes enforced (think: Texas) when an employee is terminated for whatever reason. Not everybody can afford legal action against a multi-national corporation.
Dear Mr. Reich, you are right-on! Keep the information and background coming. You provide a breath of hope in this economically immoral state we've been forced to live in since the FTC, SEC, and other regulatory agencies have been stripped of their power. You are fighting the good fight and I, for one, am grateful.
You mentioned SCOTUS. Perhaps leftist sympathisers need something analogous to the Federalist society's long term plan (which worked) to overturn Roe v Wade. I'm talking about ending the fictional personhood of corporations and the obligation on executives to pursue corporate profit regardless of the consequences. Not to mention upholding the Constitutionality of bodies like the FTC (assuming they're democratically accountable).
BTW the second half of an old friend said to me yesterday that Robert Reich (when I mentioned you in the conversation) was "far to the left". Being a lawyer involved with corporate contracts, maybe I shouldn't be surprised that someone like that might find you a threat. Recalling the old adage that people are liable to disbelieve anything that threatens their income, I wonder how to deal with such people. Perhaps by pointing to examples of success following restraints on corporate power and profit, like Silicon Valley.
You can tell your friends that there is no “far left” in the USA, which is the Communist Party-USA. Most of their members belong to the secret police (FBI).
This is so important. Thanks for posting this. Of course, I had no idea. The Biden administration is doing such good work. Matt Stoller identifies the cause of monopolies that chokehold the economy in his book Goliath. He attributes the change of legislation in the 1960's that unbridled control of large companies and gave way to Alphabet, Google, and Facebook as Goliath companies that prevent competition. He urges for legislation to take control. I hope the Democrats have groomed someone to run. While I think we need a statesman, as Biden is, I agree with you, he's too old for a 2nd term.
Biden is a statesman who has supported every false war we have gotten into, incarcerated millions of black males with his 1994 Crime Bill, publicly humiliated a black woman to get Clarence Thomas approved to the court, denied railway workers a single sick day and called it a "good deal," claims to want to end Title 42 then expands it beyond the nefarious practices of the Trump administration and refused to consider diplomacy with Putin when he was amassing troops at the Ukraine border over a several month period, preferring a costly and potentially devastating proxy war with someone he has had a relationship with for decades. That's your definition of a statesman?
That’s great news! I was stuck for two years by a non-compete agreement. I signed because it was the only way I could get out of a corrupt company, but I nearly starved for two years.
We've been fighting this for years in the Federal and State procurement worlds. I handled the approval of procurements being made with Federal funding at State and local levels across the country. We never allowed NCA but there were always loopholes the vendors found and the States were more than happy to not go through their often onerous procurement processes to get competition. I will be thrilled if/when this is rule passes!
We are currently repeating living in "the economy of the Gilded Age". I started my career in corporate America in the late 1970's at a well run, Fortune 500 company with a supportive boss & mentor-specializing in employee & executive compensation. Attended many conferences where I saw you speak Mr. Reich. My company paid for my MBA, provided expanded growth & development into other areas of expertise & was paid a good salary with great benefits. I started my executive career here & moved to other companies & industries. I was very lucky to have had my career during the next 20 years. I continued at an an executive level and saw concerning changes in the corporate world over the mid 1980's-2000's. Something was happening to destroy the working world & only in recent years have I understood what happened. I hope the FTC is successful in defeating the NCA's.
I do not recognize the world we live and work in today at all. We are in a sad state in our country & our younger generations are struggling to survive, as well as so many other people. I hope some miracle changes our political system to where those elected serve those they are elected to represent. Our democracy is hanging by a thread ! Thank you for your hard work in sharing your thoughts with so many people- there is hope for change.
The MBAs above all else have learned to maximise their compensation above all else. For example, made health care professionals lives miserable with endless reporting, graphing, meetings, etc as if patients were toyota cars. Insurance clerks rob countless hours of physicians and nurses time refusing to allow life saving meds. The system is designed to wear down the providerscand tjevinsureds. Unpaid claims are profit.
The same with educators. we have always kept records on student progress, but the mania in the 80s for data for datas sake is killing for the relationships that teachers build with students, families and collegues. I still hear from my students, I was a principal and teacher, I though I am 75 and retired 7 years ago. The students want me to know how they are doing with family, friends and their passions. They are joining my Rotary. I love my life but am saddened by those who are selfish and self centered.
My adolescent years took place in the hometown of James Stewart, the movie actor, population 40K including environs. In the 1960s, I attended the public junior high and senior high schools there. Relations between students and teachers resembled a Saturday Evening Post cover by Norman Rockwell. My buddy and I would take our girlfriends on a Saturday night double date to the movies, deliver the girls home by 10:30 pm, and then visit one of our high-school teachers, who was reliably watching a late-night TV movie. Discussion ensued, and much wisdom was passed down in those late-night conversations. I cannot imagine a scenario like that today.
Michael, I like your perspective here. I do believe the "suits" want to make life nearly impossible for the actual workers like nurses, doctors, and other healthcare providers and to make things difficult for average Americans. I do believe you are right about the way profits are accumulated. I do believe also that is why we need a rethink related to insurance. Universal Health Care would mostly take care of the medical insurance part, but the rest, it is unclear. When "the bottom line" and the profits accumulated are the only things that matter to a business, that is unhealthy for everyone. I think the stock market has helped a lot with that, but business owners and corporate CEOs have contributed their fair share. The FTC's plan to end Non Compete Agreements could go a long way to begin the process of stopping some of the corporate bad behavior and dismissal of the value of workers.
No chance of universal health care until the crazy burn-it-down GQP no longer has control of the house. They want to defund the IRS (because their mega-rich donors told them to do that) and are eager to cut Social Security and Medicare. Nice folks, huh?
True enough. But states can do amazing things for their citizens. In Massachusetts we had a non-binding ballot initiative last November.
"Shall the Representative from this District be instructed to vote for legislation to create a single payer system of universal health care that provides all Massachusetts residents with comprehensive health care coverage including the freedom to choose doctors and other health care professionals, facilities, and services, and eliminates the role of insurance companies in health care by creating an insurance trust fund that is publicly administered?”
Watch our state on this subject. And...we now we have Maura Healey as Governor. We could be the lab for progressive policies that actually help people.
And there you have the difference between Dems and Reps - Democrats try to help people while Republicans try to help themselves.
Or as has been said in the past, the GQP thinks of 'service' as being able to serve oneself.
At least this was brought up to a vote for the people to decide, and NOT the corporate paid "puppets", I mean politicians. Only issue I see with this is the word "instructed" probably should have been replaced by "required". Words matter.
yeah, but take heed of the rare moment of sunlight into "how the sausage is made in Congress"! The GQP exposed it's an entirely "top-down" institution: no speaker, no House Session, period. The GQP exposed how it's a kabuki echo chamber for money: the speaker decides "the agenda" raises money from corporations to fix the agenda, then uses that same money to select appropriate candidates in the primaries, all dressed up as "democracy". The GQP exposed that each bill that passes the House, passes under different rules, decided by the "Rules committee" in deference to aforementioned speaker's agenda: so like NFL referees deciding "the game isn't over yet" if they don't like the score, they can "keep the vote open" and countless other shenanigans. Each bill, different treatment. Who would have given us such insight? Not the MSM! We gotta USE this knowledge and press the Speaker.
This part is so sad “When "the bottom line" and the profits accumulated are the only things that matter to a business, that is unhealthy for everyone.” Our country, our people cannot rely on “the kindness of” corporations.
"Kindness of corporations"? If that ever existed, it was a very long time ago. Now, they "hide" their true intentions by doing things such as "free bagels" on Fridays, but no longer an annual "cost of living" adjustment to cover inflation. Your wage raise now will cover that they say, if you are lucky. They may give you a "bonus" at the end of the year, but this is NOT guaranteed and because it is NOT in your base salary, ANY percentage of wage increase will NOT include that "bonus" part of your compensation. Little torpedoes aimed at your financial well-being. But do NOT forget, you are getting the "free bagels".
Ruth
Look at the NYC nurses's strike. They are sick of patients being treated like objects.
Back when CEOs of hospitals were mostly doctors, patients were treated like humans. When healthcare "systems" bought hospitals and replaced the C-suite with MBAs, CFOs, and other non-clinical types, patients became widgets on an assembly line.
Small (unprofitable) community hospitals closed. Folks then had to travel significant distances to find healthcare and those with life-threatening illness/ injury burn valuable Golden Hour minutes in transport.
Those who provide direct care - nurses, aides, phlebotomists, X-ray techs, lab techs, and others - are run ragged. They care for increasingly ill patients and larger numbers of patients. When someone calls off, staffing is so lean there is no one to cover. Not uncommon when one has worked a 12 hour shift that that they are asked to stay over. It's not safe! Nurses skip breaks, and most often, meals. A bathroom break is a luxury many go without.
The quality of care is reduced as healthcare workers have to rush from patient to patient. Task to task. Financially, it looks great on the bottom line with fewer bodies doing the work, but patients are missing out on the other essentials that direct care staff provides: listening to concerns; caring, compassion, reassurance; patient education; advocating. It is cruel to deprive patients of this and cruel to nurses who go into nursing to make a difference.
Cheryl, what an excellent summary of what so many nurses experience. Then, the patients suffer, but for the hospitals, doctors who depend on the quantity of tests and procedures performed make out because ordering all kinds of tests makes up for paying attention to patients' needs and asking good questions of patients to get a sense of what is going on. Those things bring in the bucks, giving good care supposedly does not. We need universal healthcare and opportunities for more people to become nurses and other medical personnel. We need talented people, but perhaps we could find ways to help with college costs and develop tests that don't actually find out the knowledge and quality of the person wanting to become a nurse. Perhaps, the MCATs don't really indicate the quality of the person who wants to become a doctor either. It seems to me it works to get more rich white folks in medical schools while people of other groups are discarded because testing is not their gift or their financial possibility for training for the tests. I suspect the hospital administrators, those in charge of the bottom line don't want that either because people might expect them to actually hire more medical staff of all kinds. Can't have that!
Ruth
So true. Some docs order a whole bunch of (billable) tests because it takes TIME to do an assessment and the healthcare systems that own their practices want them to see MORE PATIENTS PER HOUR.
MCATs show who is smart, but doesn't show who has a caring heart.
Brilliant and much needed remarks, Cheryl. Well done.
All those who don't do the actual front line work have to find ways to justify their own jobs, often at the expense of those who are doing the front line work. You see that in many professions. Perhaps we don't need so many layers of management?
I have high hopes for the future, as the ancient _rumplican dinosaurs die out and our youth become more PROGRESSive each generation. It's only a matter of time now.
except for a minority of insurrectionists which need to be held accountable. Instead their running amok in the house.
Kudos
We don't have much "time." The earth and all its life is dying. If humanity doesn't straighten out and step up to the plate to save not only itself but other life, the time won't matter.
Unfortunately, fundamentalist religion persists in the USA and is being promulgated amongst youth. Religious fundamentalism ”always” neglects the need for economic equality because churches are typically funded by people who have lots of money gathered by a successful career in capitalism. A point of example is the situation at the US Air Force Academy, which has, of course, a chapel on campus. Despite the Sunday services offered at the base chapel, many students at the academy choose to be bussed — and are permitted to be bussed — to an off-campus Christian mega-church that is fundamentalist in nature and fuses patriotism with religiosity: God wants the USA to win. The result is an Air Force officer corps drenched in a Christian fundamentalist world view. The familiar New Testament phrase “The poor will always be with us” indicates to the fundamentalist that gross economic inequality is God’s plan, and that the officer corps somehow deserves more than the common GI. This no surprise. Inequality in the military has always existed; however, it’s disturbing that in the 21st century, the US Air Force tacitly encourages its religious underpinning.
Organized religion has caused grief since forever. Patriarchy, racism, wars, predatory behavior, greed, child abuse, pedophilia and giving people the sense of superiority with the right to judge.
and yet, Religion is less popular than ever in the U.S.
As it should be, as discredited as it is. The younger generations are wising up.
each one of us needs to be the miracle.or at the very least just show up.getting preachy here
Well said. It’s so heartwarming to see that not everyone thinks Ill of our younger generation. Have you ever thought about doing a TED talk?
That miracle would be voters figuring out which party has been killing the middle class for the last 40 years. Although it is completely obvious which party that is, when half the population lives in a disinformation bubble they can't break out of the odds of that miracle happening seem remote.
Ms. Corona, you began your career working for people who respected you and your skills and knowledge. They valued you and seemed to care about you as a person and also about your future in work. I don't know of many companies today who would either conduct training in-house or send their employees to school. Then again, I am retired and haven't had much contact with the world of employment. Your situation looks like one in which the employer and employee bargained together to create a good deal for both. Companies don't seem to have that attitude today.
Though I am a great believer in "freedom" and the right of the individual to chart a life and make own choices, I also think that human enterprise needs some governing. After all, what we perceive rarely goes beyond what we experience and what we need or want.
Never agree to sign a NCA it. All the knowledge you have gatthered working in a particular industry, is your main asset when looking for another job. Your knowledge is valuable for the new party. It happened to me when I applied for a transfer within the Company to an attractive central location for my frequent travelling. Rather than flying for 14 hours to reach the region I was responsible for, the maximum time from that location was under 3 hours and I could spend the weekends at home. It was refused 3 times.
Then luckily I was approached by a headhunter for a top job, directly reporting to the board of directors of a major industry, though it would involve possible more travelling all over the world.
Nevertheless I filed my request for the 4th time and I informed my Co that a "no" would mean I would be leaving.
Is it in the same industry?
I confirmed.
They responded that the NCA would not allow me to take that job.
I requested them to show the agreement I had signed. No NCA was mentioned.
Within three months I landed at my new preferred location where I worked for the next 17 years.
OFF TOPIC: Does anyone else think there's something remarkably fishy about the >timing< of documents marked as classified miraculously appearing in Biden's possession, from the time he was VP? Just remarkin'.
(My apology, Mr Rooijen!)
Known: 1. In a locked location, not a bordello. 2. Surrendered as soon as found. 3. So far no claims of "nuclear " or top level secrets.
Surrendered via the appropriate channels, and ........... were NOT found in somebody's personal desk.... What I want to know is how - in either situation any classified doc can get out of any building it's not supposed to leave in the first place! Every time I hear an "expert" describe the way these documents are supposed to be handled it SOUNDS like extremely tight security and monitoring. Of course, in tfg's situation, it's not hard to imagine threats, coverups, etc.... Just hoping DOJ / J.S. are looking at this as well..
One wonders if they got there via Mar-a-Lago. Remember. Not all >those< documents have been accounted for. Since - presumably - anyone who checks them out is >supposed to< sign for them, it should've been no trick at all to look up documents Biden might've checked out and snag them with the rest - just in case. An "insurance" policy. Total speculation, to be sure . . . . . . . . yet,
shoulda been the case re mar a lago too.... and in THAT case, I've been thinking "inside job", just like many other extremely questionable activities associated with tfg.
When they were discovered, Biden should've recognized whether he had taken them or not. But it also could be that his memory was fuzzy, & he just didn't question whether he had or not.
FYI - Just in:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/10/politics/classified-documents-joe-biden/index.html?utm_term=16734386127249110565df422&utm_source=cnn_Five+Things+for+Wednesday%2C+January+11%2C+2023&utm_medium=email&bt_ee=qPXpumdaQhsdUf09RTZaHnzsOYkgLju62R4PB8VF6jZeZOWqqPkV1Qq7kjmkaCUx&bt_ts=1673438612749
He says unaware any such documents were taken to that office, in the first place - not "I don't remember."
(I suspect dirty tricks even more, now - a classic "Mission Impossible" stunt. They didn't assassinate politicians outright. They'd place them in an awkward situation about which they knew nothing until they were busted or killed by their own people.)
Or it was a dirty trick that went wrong when Biden's lawyers found and returned them. I want to see them establish that Biden's fingerprints are on the document and >he< put them where they were found. My other comment explains.
I’m shocked that no secret documents were accidentally flushed down a toilet. Anxiously awaiting confirmation from the National Archives.
According to this, Biden's lawyers found the documents while cleaning out his think tank office, reported, and returned them immediately in November: https://youtu.be/xH4Bsrpg3ik The news is only reporting about it now. Timing's still fishy. Someone else suggests an attempt to hijack and control the narrative. I'm inclined to agree.
4. Q Front-leveraged Speaker of the House just seated.
DZK, you noted that too? I still don't understand why it was even reported at all since the documents appear to have no real significance. It is just another way our media has to present conflict where there is none and try to distract people from the real crimes that Donald Trump committed. It is disgraceful, but not unexpected.
They were labeled SCI. "A subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances." Bottom line Biden didn't know they were there. They were returned to the Archives by his lawyers immediately. No obstruction, no fraud!
It’s impossible, of course, but I’d like to know the kind of info that’s SCI. For example, is the number of restrooms in the Pentagon an example of SCI? We might be surprised by the trivial nature of much “Secret” information.
Yes, absolutely, I had the same thoughts. Why now. Obviously one of the new and many distractions from all the corruption of the orange con administration. Not to mention 147 Republican Congress people voted against certifying Biden as the President. I believe Revenge is on the plate for the next two years. Oh and ongoing insurrections and coverups. Their moto is “Bury The Truth.”
We must stand with and for truth. 🌎
Scott, isn't it interesting that it is the criminals, the insurrectionists who are launching investigations of the documents found at Biden's office, Garland who has not yet done anything to indict any of them, and any Democrat in office they just don't like? They can't govern, but they are pretty good at revenge, revenge for the American people knowing those insurrectionists have betrayed their oaths to uphold and defend our Constitution. None of this will go anywhere and will just waste time, but maybe that's a good thing. It might keep them from having time to attempt any of the harm they want to inflict on the American people.
Here's an article about the differences of how and when the documents were handled by TFG and Biden. I hope this info helps. https://www.businessinsider.com/classified-documents-bidens-office-difference-trump-maralago-raid-2023-1
I think it was an "oops" that was honestly dealt with. Now, if more and more boxes start coming forward, that would be different. They're just going to pick at everything they can. It's pitiful.
Perhaps. But one still wonders how it came to be discovered just as the House speaker - leveraged by the Q-wankers - is finally seated. That's the story that interests me.
My question appears to be answered: https://youtu.be/xH4Bsrpg3ik
Yes, indeed.
Not necessarily. I assume it was forgotten. When investigators were searching Trump's residence for classified government documents, that should've made Biden (or Obama) think about whether there were any such documents that they had taken that might still be lying around somewhere. But it is common for people of Biden's age to forget, so I think it's an innocent case of forgetting about a few documents that they may have taken out to review & never got around to returning.
Or, Jaime, there were so few they could just have accidentally gotten mixed with other things. There is nothing to connect these two situations, but the media in their desperate quest for some kind of balance and Republican desperate need to protect their child-man Trump, this minor mistake is being equated with Trump's theft and hiding of many many top secret documents. How sad our media thinks this is worthy of more than a 10 second note.
But now they've found more in another location. Biden says he doesn't remember them. Highly possible he took them & forgot about them, or even may be lying.
But perhaps, as DJK has suggested, they were part of the not yet accounted for bunch of documents that Trump took & were planted there, assuming that it was accessible to someone with such a motive. Would Trump have taken & kept a key that goes to those rooms? We know that if Trump & his associates could, they would have, as nothing is beneath them.
See my other responses to you. I still think the announcement timing is fishy. It distracts attention from the rules package the Q Front just imposed on the House.
My question is apparently answered: https://youtu.be/xH4Bsrpg3ik
According to the clip, Biden's own lawyers found them, reported them, and turned them in back in November. It's old news that nobody seems to have known about until now. The timing of the news release is >still< fishy!
I think it’s all about controlling the narrative and the “news” cycles.
And I think you're >right!< And that brings us back to the whole communication/marketing issue I've been on about for months!
no.we just have to wait and see what the facts are
Just remember: we've been living in a post-fact political environment for a number of years. ol' Tweety's already started calling for FBI "raids" on even the WH. Whatever the facts may be, you can bet that the Ouisling Front - they put the "Q" in Quisling - will be all over it. Strap in!
DZK, yep, the crazies have to claim these events are the same when clearly they are not. Trump deliberately stole documents and refused to return them. I suspect he intended to use them for his own benefit, although that will be hard to prove unless someone comes forward who received information from those documents after Trump left office. We don't know about the specific papers at the Biden office, but they were reported to be "confidential." They haven't mentioned any "top Secret" documents as were in the Trump stolen lot. The media just must have a controversy and will push it hard as they did with Ben Gazi, emails, and so many other non-issues in the past couple of decades, while missing what was really going on.
🙋♀️
If companies compensated fairly, offered good benes, honored reasonable requests to do things like Peter describes, encouraged / aided in the development of skills required to advance, and overall treated them as valued, trusted employees, perhaps most would NOT be enticed to leave for competing companies...
Peter, good for you, checking to see if there actually WAS an NCA. Maybe that is something all employees should check out and find out what to do legally if they can break it, then if unhappy, move on. This is the time to do that.
yeah, but the saying used to be that NDAs raise salaries or golden parachutes for those jobs that require them. To compensate for the loss of economic freedom. True or False?
Yes this is great news, if it is enacted and funded. But good ol' boy Mitch McConnell and his lackey the trumpster, have managed to pack most of the Federal court and worst of all the Supreme Court against the Constitution and the people it tries to serve. From 2003 until 2021 when I left government and went into the private sector I was faced with these non-competes. With small companies I managed to face them down and refuse to sign, but no such luck with the two corporations for whom I worked, but even there I managed to weasel out if they lost their contract, I was able to work for a different company on the grounds I didn't lose the contract they did. But then I was already in my 70's and 80's, with knowledge and experience they needed and willing to travel anywhere on 24 hours notice. My younger coworkers, especially those of both genders who had a family, were not so fortunate and they had to do the bow and scrape to stay employed. I hope this is a win, for all those coworkers, they render a great service to the business world.
Retired from DOL, I have a lifetime ban dealing with cases in my pipeline. I had a two year ban dealing with DOL. I think this is reasonable.
However when Kushner and Mnuchin left government service, they made billions dealing with the same people they were regulating. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/22/business/jared-kushner-steven-mnuchin-gulf-investments.html
When I practiced law, non-competes were valid only if there was "a separate binding consideration." According to the FTC, "Because non-compete clauses prevent workers from leaving jobs and decrease competition for workers, they lower wages for both workers who are subject to them as well as workers who are not." If there is a legally binding consideration, I can understand why an exception should exist on a legitimate basis.
Here is the FTC site. https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/federal-register-notices/non-compete-clause-rulemaking
Thanks for these excellent links Daniel. I have never understood where non-compete laws came from or why they could even exist. It seems absurd to me that (in my limited experience) why a hairdresser could not work for 6 months (or more) after wanting to leave a business and then had to work a certain distance from the business they were leaving,. Lower wage workers...what the hell? Of course Biden is right to try and do away with this, good grief, but the ruling class has more power and I predict this will not stand. My daughter, as I write this, is striking against Mt. Sinai Hospital....we are certainly living in different times, corporate healthcare is ruthless today. A major concession they want is to be adequately staffed to properly and safely administer care to patients. I know that one nurse has worked a 12 hour shift alone on a unit. Would you want to be in a desperately ill patient and want THAT overtired, overworked nurse taking care of YOU? Yesterday, corporate offered more money BUT wouldn't address staffing...strike stays on. Workers are really screwed in this country,...American life is becoming very depressing.
Most hairdressers are not "employees" rather "independent contractors." Your daughter is an employee in a union state. I live in an "at will" state. Employees have virtually no rights, can be fired "at will" unless a federal statute like the NLRB protects them.
Thank you for these great remarks
Good info Daniel. And excellent point about Kushner, Mnuchin and so many others who reap in mega dollars from people they previously regulated. The Rs frequently cross that line.
Daniel, as always, thanks so much for the information. I agree what there are certain legal things that should keep a person moving to another company, but those should be few and not meant as a crippler of workers. I have my fingers crossed that this will work out.
There's a similar type of agreement, or clause, I've seen in employment contracts that declares anything you invent, or otherwise personal intellectual property belong to the employer. Are you familiar with that" (Is there an acronym for it?) I wonder if that's addressed in proposed FTC rule.
My husband worked for a company that produced, among other things, hoses and fittings for hydraulic applications. Anything that an employee devised to improve products or processes became the property of the company.
An old friend of mine was an engineer with General Motors back in the 50s through the 80s and he invented the electric door lock. But the patent belonged to General Motors because of the same thing you were talking about. He got a nice Commendation to hang on his wall about the invention. whoopee.
Yes, my grandfather, an immigrant from the Austrian province of Slovenia, designed the offset-handle metal-wood shovel that we’re all familiar with as produced by the Heppenstahll Company in Pittsburgh in the early 20th century. As a humble tool-and-die-maker, he never got a dime from the patent, of course.
Years ago my uncle worked at Raytheon. He developed several parts that improved the way machinery worked. Needless to say, such improvements were the company’s intellectual property.
Of course they were. Did your uncle at least receive bonuses for his inventions? Some industries have been successfully sued for taking employees inventions with no compensation. If your uncle is still alive he should contact ACLU about this. I hope he kept proof, drawings, letters, thank you notes.
Yes, I am. when I worked for IBM I signed such a contract, It didn't really matter to me, since I am not an 'inventor'. One of my coworkers was and held more than 200 patents, however he was quite contented because although his patents were transferred to IBM he said they paid him well for his work and he received bonuses each time he filed another patent. Some of my intellectual work (Power Point slides) I willingly gave to my manager as they were mostly for training coworkers and I considered that part of my job. However other companies are not so generous and decent, I have hear horror stories of people spending hours of their own time, offsite, inventing things to improve a product an the company taking the idea, making millions of dollars from it and when asked for a bonus fired the inventor instead.
Just like how Nikola Tesla had his inventions stolen from him by Westinghouse corporation. They went after him and hit him with everything but the kitchen sink. He invented Quite a few things and in the end died penniless.When you get on the wrong end of a corporation and they have millions to spend you’re pretty well cooked. Edison did the same thing.He bad mouthed Teslas alternating current, he even had an elephant electrocuted to death to show how dangerous it was. What a joke.
Thank you for remembering Tesla, as you said a brilliant man with three strikes against him, honesty, genius and he was a (gulp) foreigner. Put that against good ol' Corporate America and he didn't stand a chance.
Fay, I hope this turns out to be a win too. We have certainly permitted corporations/businesses all kinds of freedoms they/we have not given to the workers who keep those businesses alive and moving. That just doesn't seem fair. Protect the rich, leave the workers with only what employers decide they want to pay. Not OK!
"This is a big deal. The FTC estimates that such a ban could increase wages by nearly $300 billion a year (about $2,000 per worker, on average) by allowing workers to pursue better job opportunities."
Wow. That should be highlighted. I had no idea it would make that much of a difference.
And share on all our social media!! We follow RR but far too many don't even know who he is, let alone follow him.
Professor:
I had already noted coverage of this new rule. And you are correct in pointing out its significance. Also noted is your inclusion of words such as monopoly and robber-barons. All of these are very significant topics that are way overdue for reconsideration. So a salute and a thank you.
This should be a much bigger story nationwide so the GOP can't gut it without workers noticing. But now that I"m avoiding twitter I''m not able to RT these kinds of issues and articles as much as I used to. sigh.
I don't think that would matter. They, the r, would hear a twisted story of why it is not good on the faux news stations they listen to. They would never know that there was a good reason for having this.
It is infuriating that they are able to puke the mostly fictional stories that they do. There should really need to be a notice to the viewer that comes across each episode that says they are under no obligation to tell the truth, "for entertainment only" - like the commercials for psychic networks had to.
faux noose viewers can't/wouldn't read. There needs to be resinstatement of stations having to provide time for opposing views.
Good idea
I like that idea. It should stay on the whole time it's not true facts/news. Our stations too.
But all of us together reposting on any social media we have would be a start.
Non-competes are a joke. Guess how quickly a company will toss a worker if that salary will help make somebody’s bonus. Pretty quickly if there are no worries about taking that talent to a competitor. And yes, there are non-competes enforced (think: Texas) when an employee is terminated for whatever reason. Not everybody can afford legal action against a multi-national corporation.
How do I send a comment to the FTC supporting this extremely needed reform?
https://www.regulations.gov/docket/FTC-2023-0007/document
reposted this at the top level :)
Dear Mr. Reich, you are right-on! Keep the information and background coming. You provide a breath of hope in this economically immoral state we've been forced to live in since the FTC, SEC, and other regulatory agencies have been stripped of their power. You are fighting the good fight and I, for one, am grateful.
Thank you for the explanation. I hope the rule survives.
Leave a comment to the FCC at this link:
https://www.regulations.gov/docket/FTC-2023-0007/document
Thanks for the link. Lots of positive comments need to be entered to balance the negative ones that will come from corporations.
You mentioned SCOTUS. Perhaps leftist sympathisers need something analogous to the Federalist society's long term plan (which worked) to overturn Roe v Wade. I'm talking about ending the fictional personhood of corporations and the obligation on executives to pursue corporate profit regardless of the consequences. Not to mention upholding the Constitutionality of bodies like the FTC (assuming they're democratically accountable).
BTW the second half of an old friend said to me yesterday that Robert Reich (when I mentioned you in the conversation) was "far to the left". Being a lawyer involved with corporate contracts, maybe I shouldn't be surprised that someone like that might find you a threat. Recalling the old adage that people are liable to disbelieve anything that threatens their income, I wonder how to deal with such people. Perhaps by pointing to examples of success following restraints on corporate power and profit, like Silicon Valley.
they do sort of
I should add that I wasn't the lawyer!
Great idea!
You can tell your friends that there is no “far left” in the USA, which is the Communist Party-USA. Most of their members belong to the secret police (FBI).
This is so important. Thanks for posting this. Of course, I had no idea. The Biden administration is doing such good work. Matt Stoller identifies the cause of monopolies that chokehold the economy in his book Goliath. He attributes the change of legislation in the 1960's that unbridled control of large companies and gave way to Alphabet, Google, and Facebook as Goliath companies that prevent competition. He urges for legislation to take control. I hope the Democrats have groomed someone to run. While I think we need a statesman, as Biden is, I agree with you, he's too old for a 2nd term.
Biden is a statesman who has supported every false war we have gotten into, incarcerated millions of black males with his 1994 Crime Bill, publicly humiliated a black woman to get Clarence Thomas approved to the court, denied railway workers a single sick day and called it a "good deal," claims to want to end Title 42 then expands it beyond the nefarious practices of the Trump administration and refused to consider diplomacy with Putin when he was amassing troops at the Ukraine border over a several month period, preferring a costly and potentially devastating proxy war with someone he has had a relationship with for decades. That's your definition of a statesman?
Notice that Biden has evolved from early congressional days. Views have evolved on race, womens issues, gay rights, warvon drugs etc.
Thank you again for your insights and sharing with us
That’s great news! I was stuck for two years by a non-compete agreement. I signed because it was the only way I could get out of a corrupt company, but I nearly starved for two years.
You should include a link to leave a comment. I went to FTC and came up with this link: https://www.regulations.gov/docket/FTC-2023-0007/document
Thank you Jane. I just submitted a brief comment.
We've been fighting this for years in the Federal and State procurement worlds. I handled the approval of procurements being made with Federal funding at State and local levels across the country. We never allowed NCA but there were always loopholes the vendors found and the States were more than happy to not go through their often onerous procurement processes to get competition. I will be thrilled if/when this is rule passes!