Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ?

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#161

Post by cwan » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 5:18 PM UTC

rapind wrote: post #159

cwan wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you assuming that the company would create a paid position if they couldn't have an unpaid internship position? I look at it on a pricing continuum. On the extremes, would you pay nothing to get work done that you considered to be important for your business? I mean I employ a number of people and I'm pretty sure I don't pay in the lowest quartile or even half of comparable skilled positions. It's almost the same…

I think our difference of opinion really boils down to our views of companies at large. Not every company is ethically responsible and many companies don't put enough thought into the hiring process at all. Once some kind of work becomes free, companies will do less and less diligence hiring for these position, simply because the value of the work becomes trivialized. This ends up hurting the workers and the company…

Hmmm - that's interesting. I think one of the best pieces of advice that I've read about being a manager is to treat each your employees as if they're volunteers. I realize that this is going a bit off the reservation now as far as our discussion goes, but it's something that I've been trying to strive for (often unsuccessfully) - but I think it's useful for building the type of culture that maximizes productivity (and, as an afterthought, is enjoyable to work in).

re: No Spec - yes, it's a position I sympathize with but at the same time, I don't believe any of these markets operate in a vacuum. Given the tensions in the spec market (or any service that seeks to be sold based on price/free), over time it seems almost inevitable that it attracts the bottom end of the market. It's the same reason why I try to make sure I don't underpay employees or service providers as the cost can be far greater in the long run if you do.

re: large amounts of data entry. Having had to do it at one time for a professor, though I was paid, being paid did make me feel as if I had an obligation to do it as right as possible without allowing bad data to fall through the cracks. I'd like to think I was better than that but frankly if I wasn't paid I suspect I would not nearly have been as careful. But that's the thing - sometimes you get what you pay for - and especially for the more menial tasks if you don't value the output that's fine but there was still a cost for the professor to manage the project and there was indeed value to the underlying data that he needed to be accurate. Indeed - often the cost of the overhead is a significant cost of the underlying wages - even more so I suspect for entry level positions.

Such is the case for managing volunteers or unpaid interns for which I don't really see too much of a differentiation. The way I see it is that unpaid work is essentially producing a sample of your work for sale. Sure you don't want to keep on doing it, but at least in a market these things tend to work themselves out. As for spec work (or any industry that provides free samples) - are also of the view that this should be made illegal?

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#162

Post by cwan » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 5:20 PM UTC

ismarc wrote: post #156

cwan wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not having much knowledge of the fashion industry, I can't say if this seems probable or not. But presuming you've done this for a week or two already why would you as an intern continue to stay at what seems to be a horrible position? Further, surely you would also recognize that this isn't indicative of the fashion industry?

I actually have no idea if this is even feasible in the fashion industry, I was just using a similar (fictitious) internship as what was described in the blog as an example. And the key is that an internship should be indicative of the business. Either way, the intern would have lost that week or two (even if they recognize it was a bunk internship), and the position would be open again if the business wanted to cont…

There is a cost to managing any project. Presumably even if for PR, one wants the PR to result in a good impression of your company? So yes, lose a week or two, does that seem so bad at the individual level? It would probably end up costing the company even more in time to filter the work. It's also not frictionless to find new staff - whether paid or unpaid.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#163

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 6:44 PM UTC

timr wrote: post #103

apotheon wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it disturbing that when "both sides of the debate have perfectly reasonable arguments" the knee-jerk response is "Let's regulate the fuck out of it!"

It's not a knee-jerk response. For future reference, a good indication of a knee-jerk response is a remark that reduces an opponent's arguments to seven-word soundbites involving profanity.

> It's not a knee-jerk response.

How else would you describe a response that doesn't even take into account the possibility that one could avoid government regulation when there's apparently no solid proof that regulation is better than the lack of regulation? It sounds like a knee-jerk response to me.

Why don't you default to "We shouldn't spend a bunch of extra money on regulation when we don't have any reason to believe regulation will help, or even won't hurt!" instead? If you have some meaningful, reasonable explanation for that choice, I guess I might have been mistaken about the idea that it's a knee-jerk response, but you haven't shared any reasons so far, and there aren't any obvious explanations for why wasting resources on regulation that might just make things worse is better than avoiding that regulation.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#164

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 6:45 PM UTC

alex_c wrote: post #158

mattchew wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You want ME to be grateful for the privilege of getting the experience of making YOU money for nothing in return? Screw YOU. No one is talking about making you take an unpaid internship that you don't want. We're talking about whether Joe Q. Eagerbeaver should be prevented from taking an unpaid internship that he does want. Whatever happened to treating people like mentally competent adults capable of making their ow…

No one is talking about making you take an unpaid internship that you don't want. We're talking about whether Joe Q. Eagerbeaver should be prevented from taking an unpaid internship that he does want. Yes, I agree, this isn't about me. I have the luxury to avoid unpaid internships, which not everyone does. There are situations where unpaid internships are good, and situations where they're bad. I'm arguing that the b…

> By that logic Ponzi schemes should be legal.

They should only be illegal to the extent that they involve fraudulent deception. Otherwise -- treat the "victims" like mentally competent adults capable of making their own life decisions.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#165

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 6:50 PM UTC

ismarc wrote: post #151

bokonist wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In every employee relationship there is: a) a wage cost to the employer b) a non-wage cost (supervision, office space, communication overhead) etc. c) a benefit the worker provides to the company Note that in general the benefit c) starts off low for an entry-level worker and grows over time with work. If c) is equal to or less than b), then the employer cannot afford to pay that worker a wage. By creating a minimum…

I agree with all your points. However, the laws are there to protect the "desperate" and to enforce a minimum worth of an employee. In many situations, unpaid internships provide a cost to the employer. The trade-off is that any exceptional interns can become full time employees, already having had most of the training, resulting in a lower initial cost to employment (training, etc.). Even for full-time positions, st…

Internships can also teach someone who has never worked in a given industry before how a given company manages its operations. This not only provides a minimal "experience" benefit, and possibly a foot in the door for getting hired on at that employer as a regular employee, but also knowledge of how the business is run. In some cases, this might help inform an entrepreneurial effort so that a new competitor may arise under the former intern's direction -- a competitor that doesn't make the same mistakes the company offering internships made.

. . . but none of that matters, because someone might be stupid enough to tenaciously hold on to an internship long after it has ceased being beneficial to the intern, thus resulting in that person being "exploited".

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#166

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 7:02 PM UTC

dbul wrote: post #61

psranga wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, one is an equal partnership, the other isn't. The unpaid internship law serves to give some protections to the little guy. Btw, I really don't understand why a billionaire (?) can't afford to pay hourly minimum wages to a bunch of kids.

I think it really depends on the industry. If someone had offered me an unpaid internship for coding at any point in my life I would have told them no because I am aware that I could easily earn money or I'd probably be better off contributing to an open source project. But consider the hypothetical in another industry. Someone gets a shot at an unpaid internship, they do really well, the company they are associated…

Coding is a much different situation in many cases, specifically because of the availability of open source projects -- which serves the same purpose as an internship opportunity sometimes. Alas, there's no such thing as "open source development" in many industries.

Even for programmers, though, open source development doesn't do everything an internship can do. In fact, some people have a really difficult time getting started contributing to an open source project without some experience working closely with other coders to learn something about collaborative workflow and code review (for instance). The exception to that is cases where someone lucks into having a local mentor to help get them over the bar to entry for open source contributions -- knowledge of how to review others' code, figure out how to improve on it, and produce patches for submission to the project.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#167

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 7:04 PM UTC

masklinn wrote: post #148

yummyfajitas wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that they are both activities engaged in by two consenting adults. It's a common belief that one is not the business of the state, but the other one is. My question: what are the exceptions to the "two consenting adults can do as they wish in privacy" rule?

> My question: what are the exceptions to the "two consenting adults can do as they wish in privacy" rule? (active) voluntary euthanasia is one, though I think it's legal in a pair of US states (Oregon since '94 and Washington since 2008).

I think he was talking about a "rule" of dominant ethics or morality, and not the law, with that question.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#168

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 7:06 PM UTC

defen wrote: post #116

uopnuiyb wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So in a recession if GM/Boeing/Walmart demand that all new hires work for no pay for their first year 'as intern trainees' that would be OK? If they fire these people on day 364 and get new trainees next year - that would be ok?

Why shouldn't they be allowed to? The hit to their reputation if they tried to pull a stunt like that would be far worse than the damage any law could do - they would never be able to hire new people again. You seem to presume that the law is the only thing keeping corporations in line.

The truth, of course, is that the law is the only thing keeping corporations alive.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#169

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 7:08 PM UTC

olefoo wrote: post #133

cwan wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is an unpaid internship anywhere close to being slavery? The unpaid intern can walk away at any time. Further, it's the choice of the unpaid intern - not their family as to whether or not to accept the choice.

That description may apply in theory, but in practice the 'employer' wields considerable power over the relationship by how they describe their assessment of the worker.

To the extent that's true, paying the worker doesn't change that at all.

Re: Want an Unpaid Internship So You Can Get Valuable Experience ? – Screw You

#170

Post by apotheon » Sun, Sep 06, 2009, 7:09 PM UTC

cperciva wrote: post #99

apotheon wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One need not be licensed to be honest.

True, and one doesn't need a driver's license to know how to drive -- but a system of licensing is the most efficient way of verifying qualifications.

I have a very difficult time associating the word "efficient" with the California DMV.