Growth of unpaid internships probably illegal

[Babs]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/03/business/03intern.html?src=mv

 

[Piotr Rasputin]

Anderson Cooper 360 does NOT pay its interns. [/crossthreading]

 

[Shoeless Joe]

I overheard the powers that be around my place the other day say they planned to make the traditional 2 summer interns we get unpaid. I just kinda walked by and said "good luck with that."

 

[Monroe Stahr]

The beauty of it is, newspapers are forever bitching about people being unwilling to pay for content. But they're perfectly willing to give interns nothing for their labors. There's a word for that. In fact, there are several words for that. All of which I'll refrain from using.

 

[Armchair_QB]

I overheard the powers that be around my place the other day say they planned to make the traditional 2 summer interns we get unpaid. I just kinda walked by and said "good luck with that."

What do you mean? They'll probably have enough applicants to be able to get away with it.

 

[podunk press]

It's legal if they are getting class credit for it.

At this point, newspapers, especially community dailies, would be stupid not to take advantage of both high school and college interns.

We have a couple slick video interns who know more than 95 percent of our editorial staff. You can say what you want about that, but they're wonderful to have around. We've gotten great contributions from our high school and college interns are are hoping to hire one of our former ones in the coming months.

You've got to take advantage of all the manpower you can get in this world of lower profit margins and diminishing advertising.

 

[Fredrick]

It's disgraceful for a newspaper that makes money to take free labor. Utterly disgraceful.

The ONLY saving grace for the student reporter would be if that reporter is getting multiple hours of credit for the unpaid stint at the newspaper. For 2 months, I'd hope the person the newspaper is taking full advantage of is getting up to 15 to 30 hours of class credit.

 

[heyabbott]

 

[Piotr Rasputin]

It's disgraceful for a newspaper that makes money to take free labor. Utterly disgraceful.

The ONLY saving grace for the student reporter would be if that reporter is getting multiple hours of credit for the unpaid stint at the newspaper. For 2 months, I'd hope the person the newspaper is taking full advantage of is getting up to 15 to 30 hours of class credit.

Yeah, most schools are generally on board with giving that much credit for a single summer internship. Just handing out those credit hours like candy, they are.

The big boys have no excuse. Anderson Cooper should pays his interns. ABC News should (and does) pay its interns. The New York Times should. I wish everyone could pay their interns.

But let's not act like everyone MUST pay their interns. Demand for these gigs remains high. Even in an age of shrinking budgets and staffs, the individual interns need the outlet much more than the outlet needs them.

 

[KG]

With this economy, no matter the job field, if an internship helps you to get a job faster, it's worth it. I had volunteer work I did help me get a job once. I enjoyed volunteering, but it was the icing on the cake when my success helped me to get a job.

 

[murphyc]

I did an unpaid summer internship while in college, paying $990 for the six credits I received at school. That directly led to me getting my first full-time reporting job, at that paper.
The following spring, new ME (who had just started) was talking about making summer internships paid, because he wanted to start getting some actual quality interns. Never did like that guy.

 

[Fredrick]

But let's not act like everyone MUST pay their interns. Demand for these gigs remains high. Even in an age of shrinking budgets and staffs, the individual interns need the outlet much more than the outlet needs them.

I don't care about demand. It's just wrong.
I don't see how anybody can back their beloved companies on this one.
Pay the damn interns or do without them. Thank you.