How Washington Abandoned America’s Unpaid Interns
More: How Washington Abandoned America’s Unpaid Interns - Stephen Lurie - the Atlantic
A legal labyrinth has trapped millions of young Americans who work every year without pay, because they are called “interns” rather than “employees.”
There’s an unattractive, neglected poster hanging somewhere in your office. Maybe it’s in the kitchen, tacked up above the microwave or next to the coffee pot. It’s the leviathan of US labor law-the Fair Labor Standards Act.
While the most common FLSA workplace notice reminds employees and employers of the minimum wage and regulations about overtime pay, child labor and tip credit, the act itself is far more expansive. But, ironically, the “employee” who has probably spent the most time pondering it—as they brew a pot, or perhaps clean the kitchen—isn’t really covered by the law at all.
The intern.
The Act is painstakingly specific, with a separate section for seaweed harvesters [Section 213 (a)(5)], switchboard operators [(213 (a)(10)], wreathmakers [(213 (b)(15); 213 (d)] and even child actors [(213 (c)(3)]. But it doesn’t offer one word for the estimated two million interns left to dredge the most unpleasant of tasks (not unlike a seaweed harvester, in fact). At a time when intern abuse is provoking a litany of lawsuits and complaints, this is plain negligence.
Internships have expanded to become a rite of passage for young workers. But often, they are entry-level jobs that pay entry-level salaries of exactly zero. For a country with minimum wage laws and a general sense that equal work deserves equal pay, this strikes many—but not all—as scandalous. In June, a Federal District Court judge ruled against Fox Searchlight Pictures, deeming their unpaid internships illegitimate. But in October, another case concluded that inappropriately treated interns cannot file suit for sexual harassment because they are not, technically, employees. Other suits, for example against Conde Nast (which has ended its internship program), and homemade insurrections, like at The Nation (who will now pay interns), have had scattered success.
Another problem of unpaid internships is that it then drives down the wages at other levels. What used to be the next step up from “entry level” now receives what used to be “entry level” wages, since “entry level” works for free, and so on up the line but of course, not ALL THE WAY up the line.