Picture this: You are a third-year college student preparing to enter the workforce after you graduate. You learn that having an internship makes you more marketable and adds experience to your resume. After applying for numerous internships, the one you land happens to be unpaid. You are now facing a dilemma because you have to cover necessities such as food and gas, but you also need an internship in order to get a good job in the future. This is the reality for college students.
Internships are often seen as gateways to jobs post-college graduation. Whether you end up working for the job you interned at or end up working somewhere else, internships often lead to successful careers. Some internships are paid while others are unpaid. But is it ethical to not pay interns?
According to the Harvard Business Review, 43 percent of U.S. internships under for-profit companies are unpaid. This essentially means that these companies choose greediness over providing their interns with a liveable wage. College students should not have to worry about paying for necessities with a minimum wage job all while balancing an unpaid internship. There are simply not enough hours in the day.
For-profit companies are not the only entities that are guilty of not paying their interns. This applies to nonprofit organizations as well. While nonprofits are not expected to pay their interns, expenses such as gas should be accounted for. With the average price of gas being $3.2 per gallon, interns should at least have their gas paid for by their employers to offset the cost of commuting.
Along with absurd gas prices, most college interns are responsible for paying for their groceries and rent. With the U.S.’s less-than-ideal economic state, college students should be able to make a livable wage while providing labor for their employers. When surveyed, 40 percent of Americans stated that they rely on having multiple jobs in order to make ends meet. Why should college students have to worry about school and internships when they are struggling to pay rent?
As a journalism student at the University of Colorado at Boulder, I am expected to obtain an internship for credit in order to graduate. This has proven to be stressful for me and my peers because most of the journalism internships offered in the area are unpaid. My biggest stressor has been figuring out how to balance an internship, school and a part-time job. Although journalism and media studies majors are the only majors that require an internship, many of my peers in other fields feel as though they will not get a job if they do not have an internship.
Some may argue that a Bachelor’s degree is enough to land a high-paying job after graduation and that internships do not help prospective employees get ahead. This is blatantly false. Forbes found that internships, specifically paid ones, often lead to a higher chance of success for employees. Paid interns also have a higher chance of being hired post-graduation.
“Companies offer 72 percent of their interns full-time employment, with nearly 80 percent of those accepting those offers,” Shawn VanDerziel, writer of the above Forbes article, said.
While I understand that there are some companies that cannot afford to pay their interns, the act of free labor simply is not ethical. If companies cannot afford to pay their interns, they should not hire any at all. Companies and organizations who hire unpaid interns should definitely not expect their interns to pay for expenses such as gas if they must drive to do their jobs. Hiring college students as interns is not an excuse to abuse the power of free labor.
Picture this: you are an employer and you pay a college intern a liveable wage. The intern is now able to pay for expenses such as tuition, bills, rent, food and gas. They gain valuable job experience all while not having to worry about a source of income. The intern works for your company post-graduation. You and the intern have both benefited from this experience.