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Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

theatlantic.com

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Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#101

Post by drumdance »

blindhippo wrote: post #56
drumdance wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not as crazy as you think. Many economists support this.

Err what? Not as crazy... Care to back this statement up with references to said "economists"? If you give organizations the option to employ people and just randomly decide not to pay them, they will at every opportunity NOT pay time. This is basic logic... the motivators for the organization propel this behavior and the American market system will reward them for it - these economists you speak of are likely cracke…

To be more clear: many economists think there should be no minimum wage because it sets an artificial floor on the market. An unpaid intern is earning what the market will bear. Put another way, they are paying for an education with time instead of money.

http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/MinimumWages.html

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#102

Post by drumdance »

gms wrote: post #63
blindhippo wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Err what? Not as crazy... Care to back this statement up with references to said "economists"? If you give organizations the option to employ people and just randomly decide not to pay them, they will at every opportunity NOT pay time. This is basic logic... the motivators for the organization propel this behavior and the American market system will reward them for it - these economists you speak of are likely cracke…

The free market actually doesn't reward this behaviour. Consider that organisations that decide not to pay their workers might very well lose out to those who do. If Organisation A doesn't pay their workers, then all my organisation has to do to steal their productive workers is to offer a wage. Organisation A loses out and eventually has to shut down, while I and the workers win.

Your decision to offer a wage IS the market. Its no different than paying more for a stock than I am willing to do. I might wish I could get Google at $10, but the market shuts me out.

Once upon a time there were a lot of companies that allowed you to "get paid to surf the web!" They are all out of business or have different models because they were overvaluing those assets.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#103

Post by pcopley »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #67
jlarocco wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internships aren't for making money, they're for gaining experience. Getting paid for them is nice, but the experience is the important part. For some companies having to pay interns would just mean they wouldn't offer internships at all. The reason interns are paid less (or not at all) is that there are lower expectations for interns and other staff usually has to take time to mentor them or check their work. Maybe…

Maybe not the best example, but if a new paid employee says, "No, I've never used source control, what's that about?" it's a big problem. If an intern says it, you explain it and move on. And thus it came to pass that the unpaid internship replaced the entry-level job. I know there's no point in pleading with an economically rational capitalist like yourself, but stop exploiting the proletariat, or one of these days…

This is honest to god one of the stupidest comments I've ever read anywhere. "Exploiting the proletariat?" Are you fucking kidding me?

I got a half semester worth of college credit for various internships and wouldn't have my current job (or subsequently my car or home) had I not had it.

Go back to Mother Russia and leave the thinking to the adults.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#104

Post by geebee »

MatthewPhillips wrote: post #94
geebee wrote: post #75

Unpaid internships seem to be rare for programmers... - Programmers of any sort who can get the job done in demand. There are more people who want to pay them than programmers available. - Even inexperienced programmers add value - sometimes a tremendous amount of value. It's not too hard to find a non-critical, short term project that would still be very useful, and the intern starts adding value on day one. So empl…

Internships are for people with a knowledge about, but not direct experience in some thing. That can apply as easily to programming as it can journalism.

It can apply to journalism, but as easily as programming? It's hard to say, this is an interesting question. I think it boils down to this: how easily can a person from the outside gain experience in a field?

There's a wide spectrum here. In software, it has become (especially in recent years) extremely easy to write and release an application to the world. Web sites, wireless apps, and so forth. So if you're going to work "for free", you really don't need to join a big organization to get that experience. I'm not saying there couldn't be benefits, but you could almost look at a startup as an unpaid internship working for yourself with massive upside.

On the other side of the spectrum you might find something like surgery. I heard about a man who knew how perform a procedure on infants, who was later discovered to not possess the right credentials and licensing. He had "learned by doing." I guess you could view much of medical school and residency as a non-paid (or low paid) internship in a field where many people believe it would be unconscionable to sidestep the normal training.

How hard is it to just launch your own fashion line, create your own "journalism" experience by starting a blog, and so forth? The world is opening up - certainly it's getting easier and easier to create, market, and distribute without the permission or help of a large organization. I think software is at the forefront, but certainly other fields are opening up as well.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#105

Post by [deleted] »

MatthewPhillips wrote: post #94
geebee wrote: post #75

Unpaid internships seem to be rare for programmers... - Programmers of any sort who can get the job done in demand. There are more people who want to pay them than programmers available. - Even inexperienced programmers add value - sometimes a tremendous amount of value. It's not too hard to find a non-critical, short term project that would still be very useful, and the intern starts adding value on day one. So empl…

Internships are for people with a knowledge about, but not direct experience in some thing. That can apply as easily to programming as it can journalism.

[deleted]

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#106

Post by eli_gottlieb »

pcopley wrote: post #103
eli_gottlieb wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe not the best example, but if a new paid employee says, "No, I've never used source control, what's that about?" it's a big problem. If an intern says it, you explain it and move on. And thus it came to pass that the unpaid internship replaced the entry-level job. I know there's no point in pleading with an economically rational capitalist like yourself, but stop exploiting the proletariat, or one of these days…

This is honest to god one of the stupidest comments I've ever read anywhere. "Exploiting the proletariat?" Are you fucking kidding me? I got a half semester worth of college credit for various internships and wouldn't have my current job (or subsequently my car or home) had I not had it. Go back to Mother Russia and leave the thinking to the adults.

"Exploiting the proletariat?" Are you fucking kidding me?

You think it's not exploitation to have to work without being paid? Are you fucking kidding me?

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#107

Post by eli_gottlieb »

civilian wrote: post #97
eli_gottlieb wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are thinking of the Chicago and Austrian school economists on the subject of the minimum wage. We're not talking about minimum wages, except in the sense that they should be above zero . We are talking about the requirement that companies pay workers at all . Do you expect people to just slowly starve to death for the sheer joy of toiling away?

Cool! So, you're a smart guy, what do you think will really happen if companies are given the choice to pay employees anything they want, including nothing. I graduated with a shitty major and I worked for free. I volunteered at a lab, to help get me some experience. I could've been doing something else, but hey, I couldn't get a job! But now that I have a skill, and that skill is in demand... I'm imagining that I wo…

When there are more jobs than workers, companies have to pay well to attract workers.

But when you construct an intern economy in which people are paid in the hope of a future "real job", you are suppressing the number of real, paying jobs. You are thus exacerbating the labor glut in these fields.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#108

Post by eli_gottlieb »

liber8 wrote: post #98
eli_gottlieb wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I disagree. Again: employers know that each employer who stops paying any wages reinforces the non-paying equilibrium by increasing the price-point-zero oligopsony. Market dynamics work as you described when buyers are required to actually pay something.

Honest question: can you point to any example in history where this has happened? I ask because, if your theory of how labor markets work is valid, it would seem that every professional sports team on the planet would be willing to reward you handsomely if you could demonstrate how this works in practice.

Honest question: can you point to any example in history where this has happened?

All periods of labor glut when it has been legal. In order for competition to force wages up (above zero, at least), there must on some level be more jobs than workers.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#109

Post by gms »

epsil wrote: post #89
gms wrote: post #20

Organisations have decided that this specific set of internships aren't worth paying a wage for. Workers have decided that they are worth their time, for the experience/foot in the door they gain. If you ban unpaid internships, companies won't offer the positions anymore (as they have decided their value is zero), which means people seeking them won't be able to obtain them. Sounds like everyone would actually be wor…

Organisations have decided that this specific set of internships aren't worth paying a wage for. ... If you ban unpaid internships, companies won't offer the positions anymore. That depends upon the demand curve for internship labor. If the demand is perfectly elastic, no internships will be offered at a higher wage; if the demand is somewhat elastic, less internships will be offered; and if the demand is inelastic,…

Thanks for raising this point. I didn't think about this.

Re: Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society

#110

Post by liber8 »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #108
liber8 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question: can you point to any example in history where this has happened? I ask because, if your theory of how labor markets work is valid, it would seem that every professional sports team on the planet would be willing to reward you handsomely if you could demonstrate how this works in practice.

Honest question: can you point to any example in history where this has happened? All periods of labor glut when it has been legal. In order for competition to force wages up (above zero, at least), there must on some level be more jobs than workers.

1. You didn't answer the question. Can you point to any example in history of this EVER happening? I'll take any example.

2. This is patently false. Even if there were 0 jobs, wages would not be zero. People simply won't work without some incentive. If I want you to go out and dig a hole in the ground, I either need to reward you for doing so, or find a way to convince you that you want to dig that hole of your own free will.

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