Articles Posted in Employee Rights

This article tries to put workers on notice that employers are increasingly trying to set up situations where they can fire employees at any time and for any reason, but the employees are not allowed to seek work elsewhere without their boss’s say-so.  This could result in workers being essentially trapped in their jobs against their will.   

Texas is an at-will employment state.  What that is supposed to mean is that (barring some specific legal violation) employers can fire an employee or any reason or no reason, and an employee can quit for any reason or no reason.  For all practical purposes, there is a presumption of at-will employment in Texas.  And nominally the 13th Amendment, which bans slavery, also prevents employers from forcing (non-prisoner) employees to work for them.  However, in the last several years there have been increasing instances of employers trying to make at-will employment a one-way street—namely, that they can fire employees for any reason or no reason, but employees can’t leave without their employers’ permission.

Probably the most common way employers have started to do this is through non-compete agreements.  As we have written about before, in Texas a non-compete is supposed to be limited to reasonable restrictions on professional activity, within a reasonable geographic limit and duration.  It is also supposed to be limited to protecting a legitimate interest of the employer.  However, employers often try to write non-competes as vaguely and broadly as possible, so that virtually anywhere an employee might work anywhere in the world (unless it’s a totally different industry that the employee would not be qualified for) could conceivably violate the agreement.  That way, the employer can mandate that all their employees agree to non-competes (often after the employees have already been working for a while) and then use the agreements as a scare tactic—regardless of whether a court would ultimately enforce the terms—to discourage employees from leaving on pain of financial ruin.  Employers may try to “make an example” of a few employees to try to develop a reputation for throwing the book at anyone who leaves and stays in the same industry, to keep others in line.