Courtesy of Mish.
Reader Mailbag
Reader “CM” writes ….
Hello Mish
Just two weeks ago, our human resources department blocked us from taking on an unpaid summer intern. The college student did not have any professional experience, but was trying to do something productive with his summer. My colleague decided to give him a shot. HR blocked the internship for fear of breaking the law.
How ridiculous is that? A college student with no professional experience wants to work as an intern and we would like to extend him an offer, but we didn’t take him on for the summer yet due to the concern that we would be breaking the law.
Best,
CM
Unpaid Interns Get Scrutiny
It’s easy to explain why HR nixed the deal.
A federal judge in New York recently ruled moviemakers violate labor laws if they do not pay interns.
Bloomberg reports Sleeping-Giant Issue of Unpaid U.S. Interns Gets Scrutiny
[Student internships], especially common in competitive industries like journalism, finance and filmmaking, could change if the appeals court upholds the ruling of a federal judge in New York who found that moviemaker Fox Searchlight Pictures Inc. violated labor laws by not paying two of its interns. Cases have also been brought against Hearst Corp., Conde Nast Publications and the Public Broadcasting Service’s Charlie RoseShow.
“This question of whether private-sector internships violate the minimum wage laws has been sort of a sleeping-giant issue for many years,” said David Yamada, director of the New Workplace Institute at Suffolk University Law School in Boston. “The absence of payment is done with a wink and a nod. Interns know they better not make any trouble about this.”
Half Unpaid…
