This is so weird. As the younger generation grows up feeling more and more entitled, the leftists are doing their best to take opportunity from young people. Gee, could there be a correlation ?
Charlie Rose, the TV interview-show host, last month settled a class-action lawsuit against his production company for failing to pay college interns a minimum wage. The settlement will cost Mr. Rose’s company about $250,000—not including legal fees—and will pay 189 former interns $1,100 apiece (calculated at $110 a week for a 10-week semester). Based on New York’s $7.25 per hour minimum wage, that reflects a 15-hour workweek.
The lawsuit was dumb and the settlement worse.
Companies will now be less likely to bring on interns. That isn’t because of the incremental cost, but because it opens the door to increased regulation and meddling from labor activists. College students will lose out on important benefits, from seeing how companies really work to building important skills and gaining exposure to people who might hire them.
[...]
My boss, a junior attorney, didn’t give me the photocopying assignments because he wanted me to figure out how to improve the work flow. He wanted the documents copied. My son’s boss didn’t ask for his creative input. And when I was a business executive who brought on interns, I can’t recall giving any of them a truly substantive—”educational”—project. However bright our interns might have been, they didn’t have sufficient understanding of the business to really add value. My colleagues and I didn’t have the time to hold their hands until they gained it.
But that is not the purpose of an internship. The most valuable purpose is exposure. Interns get to see the real work that real people do, and to see how disparate pieces come together to make an organization function.
Internships are about self-discipline, showing up on time, dressing and comporting oneself properly—conforming to the norms of the organization, not merely to the fashion of the classroom. They are about learning how to listen and observe, to be responsive and responsible. (Read More)
I seem to remember President Obama trying to outlaw private sector internships, so that kind of makes him part of the problem.
Gonna have to disagree with you here, man. Most internships are absolute garbage. There is no educational value whatsoever and only minimal networking value; they are merely a source of free labor for companies. It lets them get things done that they wouldn’t otherwise have time for and not have to pay somebody to do it.
Some internships are worthwhile, and you know a defining characteristic of them? They pay. Usually well.
Engineering, finance, accounting, all of those fields have internships, and they usually pay (for the time) the same as what full-time first-year people are making. I’ll tell you for a fact that any reputable accounting firm is paying a bare minimum of $15 an hour and that’s for the bad ones that nobody has ever heard of. The good ones are paying north of $22 an hour.
The liberal arts majors have it hard enough, they shouldn’t have to deal with no government protection in a labor market that is outright exploitative to them.
Like or Dislike:
0
What actual value does a Liberal Arts major offer when he/she walks in the door? I’m gonna have to disagree with you, John, at least based on my experience in Las Vegas. Internships here do not pay as much as a full time first year person who is there to work his tail off and gain experience; but they DO offer real world training and networking. I have seen hordes of interns springboard to a much better, well paid position—but only after they spend that year paying their dues and seeing that the world doesn’t always work according to the theories they’ve memorized. And we don’t pay them $50k a year until they’re worth $50k. The ones who understand that and dig in do very well in a short period of time. Internships are also about mentorships—but no one in business is going to take you on and mentor you based solely on the degree. You have to have the work ethic and the ability to think and create in the real world, too. And I suppose if they don’t like the low pay, they are certainly welcome to try to break in somewhere WITHOUT the experience…..
Like or Dislike:
1
I am still in shock that Charlie Rose is a Led Zeppelin freak !
I almost didn’t recognize Jimmy Page and Robert Plant from the show a few days ago. But I am one up on him, having worked in a recording studio – ah, master tapes thru DC300 amps into JBL studio monitors, eat your heart out. When i saw them at the Filmore East, the hum from their amps provoked me to yell ‘turn that damn thing down !’. Oh well, I do have a few good memories from back then.
I got minimum wage, but the rent was sixty five bucks a month, and good sirloin steak was 1.19 a pound, and college was around two grand a year, and a concert was about five bucks. There were no ticket scalpers.
But not having been an intern, i can’t speak from experience.
Like or Dislike:
1
We obviously have a crisis in internships and new standards of fairness need to be implemented. Leftists would agree that Bill Clinton would be a shoe in as Intern Czar. He has established credentials and “hands on”, some would call “tactile” experience. What could go wrong?
Like or Dislike:
1