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Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

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Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#131

Post by paulgb »

_csoo wrote: post #72
cturner wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a temptation in politics to see patterns and then fit language to it that kind of fits. It's important not to do this, because it ruins the sense of scale. For example, when someone describes a politician they don't like as a "fascist" it's disrespectful to the memory of people who are squashed under tanks and who are taken in the night by state agents, raped and murdered. Along these lines, it doesn't fit to…

Along these lines, it doesn't fit to equate unpaid internships to serfdom. Serfdom involves effectively permanent, near total servitude to a landowner for most aspects of life. Uh, wage slavery? How much of a person's salary is spent just on the basics such as food and clothing and gas and education? The minimum wage is a horrible stain on a free society. It traps people with low skills out of work and cements them i…

When I chose a job that pays $x+y instead of $x, it's not because of an "informal agreement" with my fellow workers, it's because I'm a selfish guy and would rather have $x+y than $x. If all I could get was a shitty wage, I'd certainly take it over nothing (or start my own business, or learn more skills.)

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#133

Post by cturner »

z0r wrote: post #89
cturner wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people don't get enough from employers, who pays ? I have a couple of problems with this, and will do my best to explain my reaction, but am not entirely happy with clarity. I think you're making a static view of the world, and are not considering the dynamic of the system. Legislation like the minimum wage has an effect on the economic systems that you apply it to. It changes the numer and nature of employers, an…

>Another evil I forgot to mention about minimum wage earier is the trap effect. Imagine your effective wage is worth less than minimum wage, but you've managed to land a dead-end job making minimum wage. Now you have a disincentive to refocus on something that would make you more valuable than minimum wage. There are plenty of incentives to make better than minimum wage. Minimum wage doesn't exactly net you a luxurio…

    Being able to earn minimum wage while going through
    school helps to open up the opportunity to learn more
    valuable skills for many people.
Yeah, that makes sense. Minimum wage gives those who have it a better opportunity to improve their situation than if they didn't have it, opposite to what I said in previous.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#134

Post by synnik »

mitcheme wrote: post #116
synnik wrote: post #101

Wow. We hire almost every intern that works for us, unless they suck. Internships are also normally done pre-graduation from college. It is not a job, it is in exchange for college credit. We hire the day they graduate. But it is also up to the intern to decide whether or not our internship is right for them. A overgeneralized diatribe like the one posted is aiming to get people to not intern at all, whereas the appr…

In my school, we call them "co-op jobs". If you sign up for co-op, you get college credit for them, but either way you get paid. And of course if you're any good, your co-op employers will want to hang onto you after you graduate. I didn't bother signing up for co-op because co-op or no, it's impossible to complete all the other graduation requirements and not have enough credits. So the credits you get from a co-op…

You also inadvertently prove a more subtle point of internships. Employees who offer the greatest value are ones who are engaged with the company and want to be part of it. If someone doesn't think enough of us to want to go through the trouble of an internship, and think working for us is absurd, then they would not have been a good fit anyway. No loss to us if they don't work with us.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#135

Post by rlobue »

blumentopf wrote: post #40
WillyF wrote: post #37

I didn't realize that the unpaid internship situation is as bad in Ireland as it is here in the U.S. My startup helps college students find entry level jobs and internships, so I'm constantly aware of what the latest trends are. One trend that really scares me is that there are some "career experts" whom I interact with regularly who offer their own unpaid virtual internships (I've seen lots of other internships like…

When Germany entered an economic slump after the Euro-introduction in 2002, companies loathed hiring on permanent positions. As a result, people who came out of college were hired on internships. An entire generation of young students were taken advantage of in this way, dubbed "Generation Praktikum" by the media (literally "generation internship"). It's sad to see the same happening in Ireland / the US now.

Having been a German Praktikant (but a British national) I have a lot to say about Unpaid/Low Paid internships. Unfortunately I doubt ycombinator could handle that many characters ;)

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#136

Post by philwelch »

quanticle wrote: post #68
cturner wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a temptation in politics to see patterns and then fit language to it that kind of fits. It's important not to do this, because it ruins the sense of scale. For example, when someone describes a politician they don't like as a "fascist" it's disrespectful to the memory of people who are squashed under tanks and who are taken in the night by state agents, raped and murdered. Along these lines, it doesn't fit to…

>If your labour has value then you can find work that pays you a rate for it (except for minimum wage - more about this shortly). You have the opportunity to expose yourself to experience by doing internships. If you don't have anything better to be doing, then it's a win-win situation for you and the person you're doing internship. That only works in an absolutely frictionless labor market. Meanwhile, in the real wo…

The minimum wage is a price floor, and like any price control, there's exactly two ways it can effect the economy: it can result in a shortage of labor or it can have absolutely no effect. At $7.25 it's closer to the "absolutely no effect" side of the spectrum--I've seen high turnover, low wage jobs priced above that due to market forces alone. There might be paid apprenticeships that are priced out of the market by the minimum wage, but that's speculative.

The entire rest of your post is frankly nonsense--it's clear you've never actually learned anything about economics, because most economists concede that the minimum wage doesn't really do much to help anyone, and if anything, only increases unemployment.

History doesn't back you up on this--the 19th century was a materially poorer time in the sense that less wealth was being created to begin with. While large numbers of immigrants lived in poverty, they voluntarily chose to live in those conditions because it was the best opportunity they had. If there was a minimum wage above and beyond the value their labor could legitimately produce, they wouldn't have had that opportunity and they would have been materially even worse off. More to the point, there is still a permanent underclass of immigrants living in poverty and earning less than the minimum wage in this country. When the relevant wage and immigration laws are enforced on that population, the net effect is that they're forced to live in the impoverished countries they voluntarily chose to escape from.

As for the rest of us, our recourse is to legitimately generate more wealth than the cost of our wages and benefits so that we remain profitably employed. The majority of the American population is doing this just fine without the government coming in and setting our wages for us.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#137

Post by philwelch »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #64
zeemonkee wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Along these lines, it doesn't fit to equate unpaid internships to serfdom. Serfdom involves effectively permanent, near total servitude to a landowner for most aspects of life. You don't travel. You don't get educated. You don't have upside. You can't escape. You're screwed. An unpaid internship is not at all like this. Unpaid internships are not "essentially a form of serfdom". No, but that's how serfdom started - t…

If people don't get enough from employers, who pays ? The welfare system, i.e. the rest of us. If a potential employer chooses not to employ someone, who pays? The welfare system. For either low pay or no pay, low value workers will require welfare. I don't see how this is a valid argument for a minimum wage.

In fact, allowing employers to pay less than minimum wage alleviates burden on the welfare system--not only do they have to pay less to support the impoverished wage-earner, but they are actually working in the economy and generating wealth, increasing the tax base that the welfare system draws on.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#138

Post by burgerbrain »

wccrawford wrote: post #84
JoachimSchipper wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a software developer (researcher), but are there really no tasks simple enough for interns in your average software company? When I worked as a sysadmin for a couple of months, the two (paid) intern programmers seemed to do most of the work on some (small) contracts. They definitely had some things to learn, but they got it done (with some help) and were absolutely net positive. Maybe we just had unusually go…

Tasks that simple don't provide them any experience and we're back to paying them for work done. Complicated tasks need guidance and take time. But they're great for experience. It's not even that they're really hard tasks, but that there are so many little details to software develop that everyone treats like common sense, but it's not... Until you have experience.

"Tasks that simple don't provide them any experience"

Utter bullshit.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#139

Post by dangrossman »

hvass wrote: post #27

The only reason for me to do an unpaid internship would be to do it a 'brand-name' company. You do see the best practices, meet an amazing team and it might lead to an eventual job with the company. For an unknown company - not a chance.

'Brand name' companies don't play games with employment law and the IRS. They pay their interns.

Re: Calling Bullshit on Unpaid Interships

#140

Post by dangrossman »

ThomPete wrote: post #42

If products can be free so can interns. Look at it as a freemium model.

Unlike your web app, your employment practices are subject to federal and state laws, and to the tax code. Give someone work an employee would normally do, and which isn't educational, and you must pay them. Fail to pay them and the IRS will be after you for payroll taxes and severe penalties.
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