Umpteenth Time's The Charm? Massachusetts Has Another Go At Non-Compete Reform

The Massachusetts legislature is back at it again — as the Boston Globe reports, the Joint Committee on Labor & Workforce Development has sponsored a compromise bill with the goal of limiting non-competes in the Commonwealth.

As our readers may recall, for nearly a decade, Massachusetts legislators have attempted to pass legislation regarding non-competes, to no avail. In fact, in recent years, there have been unsuccessful attempts to join California in banning non-compete agreements outright (including a failed proposal by former Governor Deval Patrick himself).

Now, with still over 2 months to go before the formal legislative session ends, legislators are once more taking a crack at it, although unlike the attempts to ban non-competes 2 years ago, the current bill may not be nearly as concerning to proponents of non-competes.

That said, the proposed legislation is not controversy-free. In fact, the inclusion of a provision requiring "garden leave," which would force employers to pay former employees bound by non-compete agreements 50% of their highest annualized salary over the last 2 years of employment for the restricted period, has prompted many in the business community to express their concern. Some, such as executive vice president of the Associated Industries of Massachusetts, Chris Geehern, have noted that employees who are bound by non-competes are often highly-paid employees to begin with, who may receive the benefit of inflated compensation in their base salary to reflect the fact that they are so bound. Likewise, the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce's president and CEO, Jim Rooney, told the Boston Globe that the inclusion of the garden leave provision was "unexpected," and likely "would be a problem for [the Chamber]." Notably, we are unaware of any other jurisdiction in the United States that requires — statutorily or otherwise — "garden leave" payments as a prerequisite for the enforcement of non-competes.

Other provisions of the proposed legislation may cause some consternation for businesses, or at the very least, may require those businesses to change their practices. For example:

The proposed legislation prohibits judicial reform of non-competes in contrast to current Massachusetts common law. This provision could have disastrous results for employers who have a good-faith belief that their agreement is reasonable and enforceable, but whose agreements are nonetheless found to be over-reaching by a reviewing court...