“I had a friend of mine recently show me a non-compete employment agreement that was absolutely ludicrous. It stated that he basically could not do his job anywhere in the world for 2 years post employment and any idea he thought of within 7 years of termination belonged to his current employer. To top it off the agreement also stated that by signing this he acknowledges that this agreement will not hurt his future chances of employment and he waves the right to a jury trial. I don't know about you but that just makes my skin crawl and my blood start to boil.”
I have to sound of on this one as well. Our society is moving so fast nowadays, there are so many concerns with terrorism, the economy, our daily lives and interests and through it all, every single legal document (which includes EULAs) that comes out further erode the rights and good nature of any agreement… The nature of an agreement is (supposed to be) a two-sided barter to come up with an acceptable agreement that both parties can live by. Today, that process is only one-sided… Have you ever tried to say, “Umm, I am not comfortable with this agreement, can we work on this?” What was the result? 98% of the time, it is… “Oh, you don’t like this, then get lost!”
Another one that rankles me is that IMO a salaried employee is salaried for 40 hours a week, which includes reasonable overtime. Yes, you have project due you are salaried you stay late to get the job done. No overtime pay for you! However many, many companies are now of the mind that a salaried employee is 100% working all the time for them, no matter what… but what is worse, everyone follows suit.
I know people who currently work 60-70 hours a week, on the norm, on top of that they are on call 24/7 and are called or paged by systems they support nearly 24/7… but the funny thing is this, they all take it in stride. No complaints and when I question them on it, they look at me funny.
Next as is pointed out in the quote above and on Tim’s blog every EULA, legal agreement, or document today, is requiring you to waive your right to a jury trial couple that with the non-compete agreements that are popping up everywhere. I have to state that I agree fully with Tim on his Chimp, but in reality, that is only the tip of the iceberg on a much greater list of erosions.
However, the greatest enemy here is the individual who just says, “OK” and moreover, signs away those rights and continues to work over excessive amounts of overtime including uncompensated on-call work. Many people have forgotten the pains and sacrifices of those who came before to give us what some of these people are casually throwing away.
I urge everyone to take a few moments and research some of the history of workers rights and the labor. I have seen some interesting articles and productions about the actual costs some of these people bore when standing up to question and change the system. I am actually amazed that data to those references is not more readily available, those changes and revolutions were not bloodless, despite some of the following quick references,
http://www.historychannel.com/thcsearch/thc_resourcedetail.do?encyc_id=214180
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_movement
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/c1/collecti-b.asp
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