In 2018, while working with a business student at Christopher Newport University, I realized that some student interns were being required to sign noncompete agreements in order to secure an internship.
This led me to write a bill to ban noncompete agreements in Virginia. The bill, first sponsored by state Sen. Frank Wagner and then Sen. Bill DeSteph, became law on July 1, 2020.
Virginia’s noncompete law is meant to protect workers from contracts that unduly burden their ability to market their skills. The law broadly defines a worker to include interns, students, apprentices, or trainees — with or without pay in order to gain work or educational experience — in addition to low wage employees and independent contractors. The fact that Virginia’s law includes independent contractors is significant, as most employment laws exempt independent contractors. Workers who predominantly derive their income, in whole or in part, from sales commission, incentives and bonuses, are excluded from the law.
Businesses are able to use noncompete agreements for workers that are not low wage earners, assuming they have a legitimate business interest to protect and the agreement is reasonable in time and scope.
The definition of low wage worker is based on the average weekly wage of the commonwealth, as reported by the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry. The DOLI posts a notice of average weekly wage every year in January. The latest notice posted Jan. 17 lists the current average...
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