Unfortunately the New York Times article is pay-walled but here is a summary:
https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/more-bosses-try-stay-or-pay-move-6508642/
More bosses try 'stay-or-pay' move
By Jake Perez, Editor at LinkedIn News
Stay-or-pay clauses, where employers try to seek “reimbursements” from workers if they quit within a specific timeframe, have now seeped across the U.S. workforce. These contracts, once relegated to high-paying or specialized roles such as pilots or software engineers, affect industries that employ roughly one in every three workers, The New York Times reports, citing legal experts. Many employers offering mid- to lower-income positions — salespeople, truckers, nurses, teachers and other roles — are now using stay-or-pay clauses, including one known as the training-repayment-agreement provision, or TRAP, as a retention tool during the ongoing labor crunch.
- Earlier this year, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a report outlining the risks of employer-caused debt, including stay-or-pay clauses.
- Workers' rights groups say these clauses often go beyond recovering company costs and “appear to be inflated financial penalties” meant to discourage job switching, per the Times.