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Search Craigslist for Washington, DC and you will find postings for dozens of public relations and marketing internships. Some are paid, some are unpaid.
I read the internship descriptions and each one that is unpaid is illegal. Disgraceful.
In fact, most unpaid marketing and public relations internships in the Washington, DC area appear to be in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
It's a shame, because there are good, legitimate, paid internships to be had in the Washington, DC area. I paid my own interns, and if my tiny company can do it, any company or organization can do the same. It's fair, and it's legal.
Better Alternatives to Illegal Unpaid Internships
Students and job-seekers should know that there are alternatives to taking on illegal unpaid internships. In addition to paid internships, job seekers and students can always obtain experience through volunteering, which is a much better deal than unpaid internships. You can obtain valuable contacts through networking, and you often get to work on higher level projects in volunteer positions. Many nonprofit organizations and membership organizations need public relations and marketing volunteers, including all the major communications organizations in the Washington, DC area, such as PRSA-NCC and WWPR.
The Difference Between Legal and Illegal Unpaid Internships
Thinking about hiring interns? You should know that the Fair Labor Standards Act protects the rights of employees, including interns. It provides that a company which employs an unpaid intern must derive no tangible benefit from the intern's activities. The intern cannot perform tasks for the company that benefit the company. They cannot do billable work. The intern cannot make copies or coffee. All the intern can do is receive the educational benefit of being at the company, and the company, ideally, should even be somewhat inconvenienced to be in full compliance with the law. There must not be any promise or hint of a job to come at the conclusion of the unpaid internship, as I saw posted in one of the Craigslist ads. Basically, a company has to take on an unpaid intern out of the goodness of their hearts, and be prepared to coach, mentor, and teach the intern as if the company were a vocational school.
The Six Criteria That Must Apply If You Don't Pay Your Interns
If your unpaid intern meets the trainee criteria, you may elect not to pay them. But the trainee must meet all six criteria:
- The training, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to that which would be given in a vocational school;
- The training is for the benefit of the trainees or students;
- The trainees or students do not displace regular employees, but work under close supervision;
- The employer that provides the training receives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees or students and, on occasion, his operations may even be impeded;
- The trainees or students are not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of the training period; and
- The employer and the trainees or students understand that the trainees or students are not entitled to wages for the time spent in training.
Interns May Not Replace Employees
Another important factor to understand is that it is illegal to use an unpaid intern to do the work at your company that a paid employee would do, but is not doing. Unpaid interns cannot be used like temps. In other words, if you bring on an unpaid intern to do something essential, like work on a specific project, edit or write a publication, or manage your social media efforts, then you are breaking the law. Plenty of cash-strapped Washington, DC companies and nonprofit organizations do this. What is legal: you can let an unpaid intern shadow an employee working on the project, publication, or social media program, and they can obtain hands-on experience while being closely supervised, but again, within the parameters of the law.
Offering College Credit Does Not Automatically Exempt Companies From Paying Interns
Providing college credit does not exempt a company or nonprofit organization from paying its interns! A common misconception is that a company or organization can elect to provide college credit instead of pay to interns in all circumstances. This is not true. Your intern may apply for college credit, which you can support, but you also have the responsibility to provide an educational environment that is the equivalent of a vocational school if you don't want to pay them for the time they are with your company. If interns perform work for your company, even if they get college credit, you must treat them as employees, and they are entitled to the rights of employees, including wages. One of the interns at my company did earn three college credits for her internship, but she was also paid the same rate as and earned just as much as the other interns. It was the fair thing to do, and it was the law.
The School-to-Work Opportunities Act
One instance in which you may opt not to pay students is when you provide a learning experience that is consistent with the specific guidelines set in the School-to-Work Opportunities Act. The requirements are similar to the trainee requirements, but more specific. Among many other requirements, it specifies that any productive work a student performs for your company must be offset by the training and education you provide. The balance must always be in the student's favor, and you must, in essence, turn your company into a vocational school for the student. It all becomes very simple to understand when you accept the fundamental idea that unpaid internships may benefit the intern, but not the company.
What Companies and Organizations Can Do To Comply with The Law
I understand that times are hard, budgets are small, and that companies and nonprofit organizations want to take advantage of the skills of interns. Many interns have web design skills, video production skills, and social media skills which are in high demand in the marketing and public relations community, and which can be expensive to outsource to contractors.
However, there really is no getting around the law. Unpaid internships, when legal, should cost the company money and resources. They are not for cash-strapped companies and nonprofit organizations on a tight budget. Unpaid internship programs are for well-heeled companies who have a mission to offer educational outreach to students.
Companies who wish to save money while getting the job done can do so by hiring paid interns, temporary employees, independent consultants, or through other means.
If you have hired unpaid interns in the past and are just now realizing that your company's unpaid internship program may have actually violated their employment rights, then I hope you will come to realize that when you hire quality people for your internship program, they will bring value to your company or nonprofit organization. The simplest thing to do, in my opinion, is to pay them for that contribution.
Unless, of course, they happen to be your kids. The law exempts parents from complying with the law for their own children, oddly enough.
A Final Note...
Interns, don't settle for illegal unpaid internships! People fought hard for these rights. Don't give them up.
Comments
try finding a paid internship in the music industry.. if whats going there isnt illegal, i dont know what is? murder? im pretty much a janitor/slave at my current internship
I recently posted an unpaid internship on DC Craigslist, so mine might have been one that you saw. And it's NOT illegal, because there's an exception in the law for most nonprofits. It would be good to give out correct information here.
Ask a Manager: You are wrong. There is no exception for nonprofits. There is an exception for Capitol Hill interns and interns working for their families, and that is it. Look it up and talk to your organization's lawyer and tax advisor.
The concept of getting paid for an internship baffles me. When I interned during college in the 90's I didn't expect to be paid as the experience was payment enough. It must be a generational "thing" to expect payment for obtaining knowledge, experience and networking opportunities. As a result, my resume shined when competing for jobs that my peers applied for as well and did not get because they lacked experience. 9 out of 10 times my internships — I did 4 of them all unpaid — put my resume to the top of the pile and now as a 40 yo I'm benefiting from it greatly. In essence, I did get paid as an intern...it just takes a few years to reap the pay-off.
This is a really interesting article. From the experiences of me and my friends, I have found that unpaid internships offer less value not only monetarily but in experience as well. Companies that are willing to pay their interns value them more. At an unpaid internship, interns spend more time getting coffee, making copies, and answering phones. At a paid internship, this is considered a loss of resources (as they are paying you). Now, it seems many companies love the idea of having interns because they think they are free labor to take advantage of, without giving in return. It is good that there are laws to regulate this! Now, if they would only enforce them...
Is this a joke? I worked for eight months as an unpaid intern and had to drive 60 miles to and from work. I wanted a career in the industry so bad I literally paid to work there due to all of the travel costs. In the sports/entertainment industry, paid internships are hard to come by. It is the company's way of weeding out the ones who are there for the status or perhaps think the sports/entertainment industry pays big. People like that amuse me. An entry-level PR job in the sports/entertainment industry may pay a little more than other PR jobs, but not much. It takes years of experience before you earn a paycheck worth bragging about. I totally agree with "former intern" - unpaid internships do pay, but it takes time.
Volunteer, intern. Same thing, different title. Unpaid is unpaid. Years ago, apprentices(interns) willingly spent years under a mentor (employer) in exchange for knowledge and skill. They even contracted to stay with the employer a certain number of years after the training. Colleges and trade schools charge for learning, interns should be grateful for free training. I'm sick of hearing about rights. The right to free food, though I do nothing to earn it. The right to sue a debt collector if he contacts me after I tell him to stop calling me. I have the right to sue if shot burglarizing because the homeowner didn't warn me before pulling the trigger to protect his rights. Don't fight for me Mary. I want no part of bureaucracy.
so what happens when this law begins to be enforced and internships that should be converted from unpaid to paid just simply disappear? I would think a lot of companies would rather pay an employee to pick up the slack instead of deal with the legal hassle and extra effort. I hope this assumption is wrong, as internships are hard enough to come by.
And who decides if your offered internship experience is equivalent to a vocational school experience?
Guess what's not a joke? When I'm paying $2100 for three credits for an internship, I'm not getting paid for the work I'm doing at a non-profit organization, and they have me doing work that they pay temps $10 an hour to do. Not to mention work that no one else in the office wants to do, like pack boxes, stuff envelopes, and solicit donations from local businesses over the phone for their fundraisers. What's really not a joke is that students are forced into taking these internships that are often only beneficial to the company, because the amount of paid internships is limited and you're required by your school to do one. It's not about being sue-happy, it's about being treated fairly. Hey "yes,it's a joke", would you want to take on all the jobs that no one else wanted and pay THEM for it??? What FREE training should I be grateful for? Learning how to pack a box, stuff an envelope, and bug people on the phone?
Thinking about how many businesses take on an intern to do the "grunt" work seems normal, the thing is that the unpaid internships are not worth your effort most of the time. As a friend of mine told me, "If you’re not being paid for your efforts at an internship then they don't mean anything to the company, and if you’re not doing anything that the company cares about you are most likely not learning anything of value in the end." I actually rejected two unpaid internships last year because they wanted a gopher and not a young professional to work for them, and both were unpaid.
I'm glad there is so much discussion on this issue of the exploitation of illegally unpaid interns. I heartily agree that companies VALUE what they pay for! For those who worry that paying interns will cause companies to not hire interns at all, Organizations do have the option of offering part-time, paid internships, if that is more affordable. But we are talking about a sm. investment relative to other expenses. Nonprofits may offer volunteer opportunities (NOT the same as an internship, where you may have to forgo other employment, invest in work clothes, etc.)
There was a time when factory owners who employed small children also said they would go out of business if forced to pay fair wages. Do you want to intern for a company or nonprofit like that?
What is essential to understand is that this is the LAW, not just my point of view. Not paying interns under certain circumstances is just as illegal as stealing.
Thank you for using your real names in comments.
"Yes, it is a joke": I feel your frustration. I believe the law is created for the bigger picture, and we must judge it as that: The law relating to collectors harassing debtors is in place to protect all debtors, which will invariably include those, for instance, willing to pay but are too ill to do so at the moment. Harassment would not ensure payment but rather further illness. Whether that case is the exception is of no consequence as our country and its laws, based on Old World experiences, were created to protect the minority who cannot, by shear might, protect himself. The criminal being able to sue for being shot is not to protect the criminal, but to ensure that shooting homeowners are actually accosting criminals and not, let's say, a drunken family member stumbling around the house. You would be less trigger happy if you knew your actions could cost you millions. Likewise, the intern law ensures substantial experience over not slave labor. Pay or TRULY train, for free!
"Former Intern" and "Yes, it is a joke": In the past, we were able to work for free because the cost of education was lower, and, thus, debt was considerably less, and families could afford to send their children to school without taking out enormous debts to pay for it. And for those whose families still could not afford to send them to school, despite the low cost of education, didn't go, despite intellectual fortitude or work ethic. So, what happened to the workforce, and thus society? It was blander and society was less dynamic, with slower growth and greater levels of poverty (I would say there was a greater number of government-dependent citizens, but I don't have the #'s to back that claim -- just instinct). For those of us with high IQ's and low-income families, who had to work through college, even with the supplement of scholarships -- it wasn't about a feeling of entitlement -- if we worked for free, we didn't eat. Growth demands diversity. Diversity requires pay.
"In the past" for me was just two years ago. I am from a middle/low-income family, which means I worked a part-time job in ADDITION to my unpaid internship. All the work and stress resulted in my GPA not being suitable for scholarships and I wasn't eligible for financial aid, which meant I had to take out numerous student loans to pay for my four years of college. But guess what? It paid off. My experience is what got me my first job out of college - and a darn good one at that. However, it doesn't change the fact that it will take me years to pay off that debt. THAT is an issue worth discussing. Why should people be punished for wanting to better themselves? Why should people be punished for following their dreams? Getting back to the original discussion. Working for free absolutely sucks. Doing the grunt work sucks. But life sucks. So put on a happy face and realize that we Americans have it better than other parts of the world.
"In the past" for me was just two years ago. I am from a middle/low-income family, which means I worked a part-time job in ADDITION to my unpaid internship. All the work and stress resulted in my GPA not being suitable for scholarships and I wasn't eligible for financial aid, which meant I had to take out numerous student loans to pay for my four years of college. But guess what? It paid off. My experience is what got me my first job out of college - and a darn good one at that. However, it doesn't change the fact that it will take me years to pay off that debt. THAT is an issue worth discussing. Why should people be punished for wanting to better themselves? Why should people be punished for following their dreams? Getting back to the original discussion. Working for free absolutely sucks. Doing the grunt work sucks. But life sucks. So put on a happy face and realize that we Americans have it better than other parts of the world.
As long as people accept work for no pay, employers will (illegally) take advantage of them. And that hurts everyone.
There is virtually no enforcement of these laws. Even the International Labor Rights Forum (a nonprofit) offers unpaid internships -- the irony!
Unfortunately, it is up to interns to say NO to any internship that does not offer pay, unless it meets specific legal criteria (few internships meet this criteria).
Interns, please seek paid internships, or volunteer opportunities, to obtain experience.
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