Young, talented and working for free: the video

They had a great idea over at InternsAnonymous.co.uk: a series of interviews about internships.

It’s time to put a few faces on the issue, to make it more real and personal. Let’s hope there will be some more of these videos.

Is It Immoral to Pay for Unpaid Internships?

Derek Thomson, over at The Atlantic, has another blog post about unpaid internships – a slightly different issue from unfair internships, as should be kept in mind. I have commented rather extensively over there so I’ll lazily re-post my comments here. His point is that it’s the fault of the college career centers if there is demand for middlemen charging to find internships.

There is a large-scale illegal use of free labor and it’s the fault of the college career services that aren’t making enough efforts to place their students unpaid internships? Well, at least it is an original explanation.

Just because there is demand doesn’t mean that it’s justified (otherwise, why legislate for anything? there’s a demand for speeding!). Students create the demand and resort to middlemen in a race to the bottom between each other to get a (paid) job. Some time ago, they would start by accepting an entry-level salary, less holidays, etc. Fair enough. A few years later, students have to do an internship to gain some experience and then get a job. Then they have to do a second another internship. Then, internships are a necessity and the competition is too high, so to get a leg up, you need to pay to get an unpaid job. Makes you wonder what’s next.

I mean: how else would it happen if it was unfair? People entering the job market are a vulnerable part of the labor market and employers are taking advantage of it. No wonder it’s illegal. Check the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Or go to http://www.UnfairInternships.com where we have been blogging about this issue for three years. It’s a scandal hidden in plain sight.

Are Unpaid Internships Destroying America?

This is the provocative title of a post from Derek Thompson at the Business blog of The Atlantic. It is built around Anya Kamenetz’ article in the NYT three years ago. I’ll reproduce my comment here, which sums up arguments made over the years on this blog.

Unpaid internships are often unfair and illegal (see the Fair Labor Standards Act).

The short explanation: if you’re contributing to a company, you deserve a salary. Call it an internship, a job, a contract, an assignment – it’s all the same. If your internship is actually an apprenticeship where you’re a drain on a company that goes out of its way to train you, it’s legal.

Yes, interns gain valuable experience. But aren’t all employees benefiting from their work experience? It leads to improved productivity, pay increases and promotions. Entry-level employees already receive a lower, entry-level salary for their lower productivity.

“I do think the internships paid off, inasmuch as they led to other internships and, eventually, to jobish things.”

This illustrates well the collective action problem: some time ago you could get a job out of school, then to get a leg up, you would do an internships, then everybody does and you need two to get ahead, then everybody has two… This is where we are now. There is a law against it. It is just ignored because graduate students have little power in the job market and their internships are just a transition.

More questions are addressed at UnfairInternships.com. Thanks for talking about the issue.

If by any chance I get visitors coming from The Atlantic looking for more, have a look at the FAQ for more answers or click on the tags such as “Legal” for more references.

No Pay, No Gain

Another mainstream media, this time in the United Kingdom, talks about unfair internships. Josh Freeman Berthoud signs “No Pay, No Gain” in the Guardian and has this angle:

And yet what’s the point of striving to ensure equal academic opportunities for all people, regardless of socio-economic class, when once they leave university the traditional wealth and class barriers kick in and poorer people are deprived entry to the most prestigious industries?

Josh correctly observes that the problem with unfair internships is not that the tasks are menial, but the opposite. These internships are real jobs, only with no or little salary.

(…) these are some of the most common industries where you are likely to find interns working long hours, performing difficult, demanding and important tasks for little or no money.

It’s refreshing that most of the comments are supportive of Josh’s (and this blog’s) opinion. In the US, it all too often goes the way of accusing the intern for taking the job, being fatalist about it, saying that it’s a win-win — basically, just not seeing the problem of un(der)paid labour. If you are in the UK and aware of legislation that may prevent unfair internships, please let us know and we’ll post it on this website.

Finally, Josh tells an interesting insider story that helps explaining why we hear so little about it in the media:

I wanted to write a piece on this very subject a few years ago, but the national paper – with whom I was an intern at the time – told me that they were aware of the problem but that they wouldn’t be able to print the story, as they were as guilty as the next firm.

So much for the “liberal media”. This means that blogs will have to take up the fight.

Spirofrog – A German Resource

A good way to fight unfair internships is to turn them down in the first place. It would be easier if sufficient alternatives were available. Here’s a German tools that should help our German-speaking readers: Spirofrog. It lists only fair internships, based on the German initiative, Fair Company.

Tor students this service is great as they get access to “paid only” internships free of charge, and companies can display themselves as a ‘fair company’.

It lists internships anywhere in the world, not only in Germany, so get yourself a German/Swiss/Austrian friend and start digging. Apparently, an English version is planned in the next few weeks. Stay tuned.

(By way of Blognation)

How to report an unfair internship

If you’re here because you think you’ve got an unfair internship yourself, you’ll be happy to know that you can report it to the authorities anonymously enough.

This blogger has taken the time to go through the whole process. It took him a certain time to find out, for which we are grateful, meaning that you can take the fast lane in following his steps.

1. Try to determine if your internship is truly an unfair internship. Compare your internship program to what the law (the federal Fair Labor Standards Act) says. This article is a great guide.
2. Find your local [Department of Labour] office. You can find your state’s DOL website here http://www.dol.gov/esa/contacts/state_of.htm but you ultimately need to contact your local office, which might be a city or county office.
3. Call them and let them know why you think your internship might be illegal.

In a different post, he details how the process went. It’s quite informative. You may be reassured to read that “They only get your contact info if they need to contact you. You will not be mentioned in the investigation in any way and your privacy is protected.”

If you’re an employer, you may be interested to know that your interns can report you of they are treated unfairly. As the blogger says: “One of the things they will do is to give a surprise visit to the company in question.” It keeps you honest.

So that’s for the United States. Anybody knows how to report an unfair internship in another country?

Stop the press: interns are having a drink!

The Washington Post is taking internships very seriously: they have an article about them almot every single day of the week. I keep for later an in-depth review of their First Jobs & Internships Guide, but the iron is hot for their article “At Workday’s End, Interns Turn On the Schmooze” (August 13th, 2006).

It’s not a very interesting read and it casts interns in a unfavourable light as if they were show-off and desperate for prestige and networking in a different way from other graduates and young professionals. The fact is: they are different only because they are not paid for their work. What can you expect if the only salary you offer them is the opportunity to network? Sure, they will. Some of it sounds a bit sad, but I’m not sure the basic concept deserves mockery.

Nevertheless:

• Rusty at Why I hate DC makes some funny points, but fails to recognize that  going out in bars and networking is not a specific intern activity.
• Alec Brandon at the Chicago Maroons blog proclaims: “So glad I am not a DC intern“
• Even Wonkette deigns to refer to the article.
• A village idiot notices that most of them are white. I’d be more curious to have a socioeconomic profile to see how many come from privileged backgrounds, which is a fundamental flaw of unpaid jobs.
• Martin Austeruhle at DCist, Johnny Shades at Cafe 227, and Matthew Igelsias are probably asking the right question: what’s news about this article? Unfair internships, congressmen potentially violating the law by not paying their staff and the Post announces that these youngsters hang out in pubs after work?

Examining the Entry Level Intern

Phoebe Maltz deserves praise for the clarity of her explanation on what makes a fair internship in her blog posting “Examining the Entry Level Intern” on The Gothamist (May 21, 2006).

The justification for an internship being unpaid is that the position is an educational experience for the intern; the transfer of goods is from the organization to the intern. While both a paid internship and a traditional job also serve as learning experiences for the employee, an unpaid internship ought to differ from these other situations in that the help provided by the intern to the organization is negligible.

The fundamental point here is that you deserve to be paid even if you’re gaining experience as an intern. Everybody that works is gaining experience, but they are paid nevertheless.

But some business seem to think that they can hire an unpaid staff by calling the job an internship. How is the following job posting, digged out by Phobe Maltz, an internship?

“Duties include filing, setting up new filing system, creating and editing org charts, updating 401Ks and other files, assist Human Resources Director in all duties, etc.”

As she observes:

“The unpaid internship has expanded to encompass all manner of jobs formerly known as “secretary” or, more recently, “administrative assistant.”” “It now seems almost greedy to expect compensation, any compensation, for work.”

But the shame shouldn’t be on the intern for expecting a salary. It should be on the organization for not providing one.