I got a little hint of it on the news tonight. Its only a small story, perhaps even an insignificant one, but it gives you an idea how a nation dominated by commercial interests would look like.

Ever hear of a non-compete clause? No, its not legal protection for businessmen who would rather not have to compete against others; but its close. Its an article in an employment contract where the new employee promises, on pain of legal action, to not work for a similar business nearby, or for a set time in the future, after he or she leaves the firm.

Its not totally unreasonable, an employer should have some means of discouraging an employee of leaving with trade secrets, or of taking advantage of expensive or specialized training and delivering it to the competition. And its only fair they don’t take clients with them to their new employer! Even the medieval guilds often made their apprentices set up shops in another town after they had completed their training.

But this is different, its not to prevent skilled workers from leaving after their employers invest heavily in them, its a mechanism to intimidate unskilled manual labor from migrating to another shop where they might get a better salary or working conditions. It destroys the free market in labor. If you work for a sandwich shop, a non-competition agreement would prevent you from going to another sandwich shop to work. And if all you knew how to do was make sandwiches, or if that is the only kind of work available in your community, that pretty much amounts to slavery. It is also highly unlikely you could afford a lawyer to take your boss to court to fight it.

The American entrepreneur is known for his ingenuity and innovation, and this is a perfect example. Its pretty ingenious (and certainly more profitable) when you figure out how to compete against your own employees instead of your competition across town. Its free enterprise innovation to force your wage slaves to toil in your sweatshop even if the competing shop can offer them a better deal, or even a promotion!

I’m not making this up. Google “Jimmy Johns non-competition clause”. This is what a world where business interests dominate the courts and legislatures will look like, and where legal means of stopping these abuses and protect workers are dismissed as “socialism” and “excessive regulation”.

Actually, perhaps I’m being unfair to Mr Trump. This is what a Republican America would look like.