AHA shares concerns with FTC on employer noncompete agreements

The AHA Oct. 20 responded to a request for information from the Federal Trade Commission on employer noncompete agreements. The AHA expressed concerns about letters the agency sent in September informing certain health care employers and staffing firms to review their employment agreements for unreasonable noncompete agreements. “We agree that certain non-compete agreements can ‘have particularly harmful effects in health care markets,’” the AHA wrote. “But it is important to be clear about which kind of non-compete agreements can have these adverse effects so that the FTC can appropriately tailor its enforcement efforts.”

The AHA urged the FTC to target any enforcement efforts against practices excessively constraining lower-skilled, lower-wage employees who lack bargaining power, and to not challenge noncompete agreements that are negotiated and agreed upon by highly skilled or highly compensated employees, such as physicians and hospital executives.