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My experience is that (1) Most threats like this aren't legally credible (2) That doesn't stop employers from filing (and losing, if not settled) lawsuits.

For most employees, a lost lawsuit means you lose 2 years of your life, get PTSD, and go bankrupt. You might recover legal fees after you've lost the house. Yay!

If you've got a megabuck, you're okay. If you live paycheck to paycheck, you're SOL. If you're a high-income / low-savings immigrant from a low-income country, you're SOL too. You settle. It doesn't matter if they have no case. You settle.

As a footnote, this dynamic does play out re: grad students versus elite universities, under NDA. Source: I know MIT does this from first-hand knowledge, and I have suspicions about a few peer schools.

The very existence of a non-compete will also scare off some employers. I worked for a very small company for a number of years and we basically wouldn't even talk to anyone who had a non-compete even if it seemed low risk. Just wasn't worth it--especially if they were from a client.

> re: grad students versus elite universities, under NDA.

I think it is important to not conflate NDA and non-compete, NDAs have a validate place, and are likely what should be used instead of non-competes in most situations.

Can you elaborate on the grad student NDAs?

I'm surprised, because this seems like it would undercut the whole point of grad school (i.e., publishing) and it's very different from my experience (NDAs limited to patient data, etc).

> might be at risk of being sued.

Being alive puts you at risk of being sued. The question is whether they have a case. As you said, an actual attorney would roll their eyes, but people still get scared.

I've said it before, and I'll keep saying it - don't let lawyers bully you. If they have no case, that is the end of the story. If they do have a case, it gets more nuanced. But most of the time, lawyers are just sending out letters as scare tactics, with no bite to them.

Especially when it comes to non-competes, each jurisdiction is quite different. Where you live has a large impact on whether or not a lawyers pursuing a non-compete agreement actually have a case. Educate yourself on your local laws, ask an attorney, but don't let anyone bully you into holding back your own career moves.

> My state has severely limited non-compete agreements to the point that they’re only narrowly enforceable, if at all.

Same here, but that does not stop the former employer from filing suit and causing havoc for the newly hired employee and their employer. Every time it's happened to someone I've hired, it is a former manager or business owner who is personally angry at the former employee and is trying to harm them. Seems pretty pointless.

> Some others also went into hiding and lied on their LinkedIn profiles to prevent their old employer from finding out they went to competitors.

I avoid telling my employer where I'm going when I leave. There's simply no advantage to me to reveal that information. You can just say your quiting to take some personal time and deal with burnout. Perhaps that personal time is a 2 day weekend before your next job begins.

You don’t even need to say that. My three lines I’ve used for every job are:

The resignation letter simply reads: “Effective today’s date I hereby notify my employer of my intent to resign my position of position on date two weeks from today”. Signed and dated with nothing else.

If asked why, the answer is “I’ve decided to seek opportunities elsewhere”.

If asked where, the answer is “I’d rather not say at this time”.

As you say, there’s almost no benefits and only drawbacks to divulging any other information than that in most cases.

There should be a phone number you can call that basically tells you the answer as to whether you should apply for a job and ignore the non-compete. It could just be a pre-recorded message saying "Yes".

No state is going to want to protect monopolies over the employability of its citizens. No one wants you to become dependent on the government dole.

The vast majority of non-competes are unenforceable. If you're unlucky enough to actually be in an enforceable one, the chances are you already have a relationship with a lawyer.

Seriously, why do employees worry about this.

Something like this happened to people who left my first job in the industry.

They didn't have to win the lawsuit. The competitor that the employee went to fired the employee after they started. Presumably, it was because they didn't want any problems from the employee's previous employer, or just didn't want the headache at all.

Isn't that simply a harassment? I would report employer to the police and ask for an injunction.

If the employee told the employer to stop contacting them, then yes, it would be harassment.

What state is this?

This is a decent state-by-state overview of the enforceability of non-competes: https://www.wonder.legal/us/guide/what-is-the-enforceability...

California, in all likelihood.

California Business and Professions Code Section 16600, “every contract by which anyone is restrained from engaging in a lawful profession, trade, or business of any kind is to that extent void.”

Probably not california, NCC applicability / legality is so restricted that I don't see how

> they could try to make my life difficult with legal proceedings if they wanted.

could work, the first judge involved would throw the entire thing out and threaten the company for wasting the court's time.