>>20110705I've had to sign a couple of those suckers and hated them. They were companies, when I was starting out, where you could literally work 90-100 hour weeks (traveling belt maintenance), and shifts over 24 hours if a belt was down at a mine and therefore production was down. That's like an emergency for the company and the maintenance guys have to get their asses in gear and get those belts moving again so production can resume. A single mine can easily be losing tens of thousands of dollars per hour when production has to stop.
The work was important, and I respected it and knew I was making a real contribution, which felt good. And I learned a lot. But I hated the noncompete agreements those belt companies often make you sign. When you're working an average of 75 hours a week, tempers sometimes flare and people quite or get fired in those scenarios. It never happened to me, but I just didn't like the thought that if I walked out or got fired over some bullshit because people were overworked and had short tempers I couldn't get another belt mechanic job on one or the other side of the Mississippi (one company limited their non-compete agreement to just the east side of the Mississippi River in the United States).
I say good -- get rid of non-compete agreements as a condition of employment. Let workers decide where they want to work. That's an increase in liberty for the majority and a decrease in control for the minority.
