[Sixstrings]

From record-low unemployment to a loss of 6 million jobs since the start of the recession, the U.S. labor market is hemorrhaging. Ironically, in this climate of unprecedented mass layoffs with expectations of more, American workers are better educated than ever. And yet increasing numbers face a stark reality: nonwage work.

With revenue-challenged employers, fewer opportunities, and even less demand, postgraduates and laid-off, mid-career professionals from Boston to Silicon Valley are hardly loafing. They conduct surveys, develop products, strategize funding, manage books, and spearhead social media branding-for free.

Welcome to Intern Nation, where postgrads pay $9,000 to work for free and serial interns build their skills in back-to-back unpaid gigs so they can one day secure a paid position with low wages that may take them years to remedy. It's a world where interns replace employees who go on maternity leave, fill in for an entire staff of let-go workers, and represent brands online in "intern jobs."

In this no-loss, maybe-gain landscape, out-of-work product developers and strategic planners armed with MBAs and engineering degrees bide their time at startups that may never receive funding. Last month, unemployed fortysomethings stood alongside millennials at an unpaid-job fair hosted by JobNob with about 300 attendees, including a past CFO, hoping for a match with one of 50 startups in need of bodies. Even ex-Wall Streeters settle for the big zero. Lawyers do, too.

Before Bust 2.0, working for free was as appealing as eating pork during a swine flu outbreak. Newly minted Ivy League graduates lined up for paid internships and got top jobs in finance, consulting, marketing, and other industries. MBAs headed from salaried summers to top jobs with hardly a ripple, and experienced workers made lateral moves as salaries rose or remained steady. Now, thanks to the economic downturn, some job seekers say they are lucky to land an unpaid position at a small company or startup where they can leverage skills while keeping a toe in the job market.

The U.S. Department of Labor measures unpaid work as 15 hours or more of weekly labor on farms or in family businesses. But that classification doesn't tell the whole story. With the ever-narrowing pipeline of paying spots, there's still a lot of other unpaid work out there. Is it still work when it's done for free? What is its value beyond being an excuse to leave the house dressed in business casual? How long should it take to reap monetary rewards? Is it bad for one's reputation, and if someone is willing to take unpaid work, does it demean him? Or is unpaid work just another manifestation of "free is the future of business"?

In this no-loss, maybe-gain landscape, out-of-work product developers and strategic planners armed with MBAs and engineering degrees bide their time at startups that may never receive funding. Last month, unemployed fortysomethings stood alongside millennials at an unpaid-job fair hosted by JobNob with about 300 attendees, including a past CFO, hoping for a match with one of 50 startups in need of bodies. Even ex-Wall Streeters settle for the big zero. Lawyers do, too.

Before Bust 2.0, working for free was as appealing as eating pork during a swine flu outbreak. Newly minted Ivy League graduates lined up for paid internships and got top jobs in finance, consulting, marketing, and other industries. MBAs headed from salaried summers to top jobs with hardly a ripple, and experienced workers made lateral moves as salaries rose or remained steady. Now, thanks to the economic downturn, some job seekers say they are lucky to land an unpaid position at a small company or startup where they can leverage skills while keeping a toe in the job market.

The U.S. Department of Labor measures unpaid work as 15 hours or more of weekly labor on farms or in family businesses. But that classification doesn't tell the whole story. With the ever-narrowing pipeline of paying spots, there's still a lot of other unpaid work out there. Is it still work when it's done for free? What is its value beyond being an excuse to leave the house dressed in business casual? How long should it take to reap monetary rewards? Is it bad for one's reputation, and if someone is willing to take unpaid work, does it demean him? Or is unpaid work just another manifestation of "free is the future of business"?
http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/judgments/2009/06/10/intern-nation?page=0,1

I never knew they actually had job fairs for internships. Seriously though, I can see this as not being a bad idea for young workers looking for some experience. But I think there's a line that can be crossed, where companies take full advantage of free labor whilst mom and dad continue to support their recent grads.

And, what a commentary on the job market that some 40-somethings are taking free work just to have something to do, unable to find a paying gig. I guess maybe it's better than sitting at home collecting unemployment, but it's still not good. There just are not enough paying jobs out there.

[anador]

Its just sad. Many of these people could have spent their education dollars at a trade school and have a real job that is much more rewarding than some desk job chasing paper.

Not to mention they are spending months working for free and often having to pay their employer for work? Crazy.

One of the true damages the suburban-make-an-easy-bundle-in-the-business-world-mentality has caused is an utter degeneration of the reputation and quality of our trade school system.

It used to be considered a positive and equally respected alternative to college training to simply go out and learn to do something tangible, something with meaning.

Tradeschools are now frowned upon despite the fact there is high demand for skilled and passionate tradespeople.

The result? Middle class kids that have no reason for going to college, no passion, no drive or ambition, going to university just because it is socially obligatory.

They take a major they figure they can make a buck on and then get a job they feel apathetic towards.

Now that the system has broken, there is a high degree of diminished returns on the ever increasing price of education. Yet Kids are still enrolling in these business, management, schools and there is no work once they get out.

Its just sad that the days when you could have an actual skill, do an honest days work, and come home feeling accomplished and useful are apparently gone.

[vision-master]

My Dad went to one of the best trade schools in the County during the 30's. During WWII he flew with the officers as his skills were in high demand. No truck transport for him. He was only a corporal too.

[jbrovont]

Banks borrow money from the Fed at effectively 0%, and instead of loaning it to consumers, collect about .30% on it because it's safer. Meanwhile, unfunded start-ups and established businesses are so strapped for financial backing and economic activity, that people line up to become effectual voluntary slaves in the hopes that "one day things might possibly get better."

There are so many things wrong with this picture, I don't even know where to begin.

[heroineworshipper]

Why do these people work for someone else for free instead of inventing their own work? Oh yeah, there will be enslavement, cannibalism, & zombie invasions.

[anador]

Why do these people work for someone else for free instead of inventing their own work? Oh yeah, there will be enslavement, cannibalism, & zombie invasions.

hahaha What in gods name are you talking about?

If the point you meant to convey was "After the crash there will be no need for skilled tradespeople" I highly disagree.

People with the office training are the ones who will be most unable to cope with the crash. People that have been working jobs that require them to use a skillset, creativity, and their bare hands will be much more able to adapt to a sudden collapse of the service sector.

There will still be machines, plumbing, carpentry, homegrown electricity, construction, and repair in this new world. Why wouldn't people benefit from going out to work on their own in a trade?

They will be some of the most valued members of society after the crash, they who can help themselves.

[dinopello]

We have a few summer college interns (Engineering). We pay them though - 15 to 20 bucks an hour.

[anador]

In truth, I am presently an intern for an urbanism\architecture firm that is starting to specialize in transition towns.

But i also have 2 years of college left.

I am personally extremely passionate about planning and I believe my education will prepare me, in some unique ways, to be an active member of post peak local society.

I am getting payed 12 an hour, which is presently, enough for me to sustain myself with food in an apartment.

My roomate however has to pay 9000 dollars for a summer internship at a financial asset management firm.

He doesnt give a damn about the work he's doing and he complains all the time.

That, in my opinion, is extremely unproductive.

[Sixstrings]

In truth, I am presently an intern for an urbanism\architecture firm that is starting to specialize in transition towns.

But i also have 2 years of college left.

I am personally extremely passionate about planning and I believe my education will prepare me, in some unique ways, to be an active member of post peak local society.

I am getting payed 12 an hour, which is presently, enough for me to sustain myself with food in an apartment.

My roomate however has to pay 9000 dollars for a summer internship at a financial asset management firm.

He doesnt give a damn about the work he's doing and he complains all the time.

That, in my opinion, is extremely unproductive.

I can certainly understand interning while IN college, or for a short period just after. What got my attention here is that apparently (according to the author, who knows for sure though) college grads are taking much longer unpaid internships. And, something not seen before, laid-off older folks are choosing to work for free rather than have a gap in the resume and stigma of not having a job to go to every day.

It does seem to be a trend, with British Airlines asking it's employees to work for free for a couple months for the good of the company and all that.

I would say if you're looking for an unpaid internship to lead to a paying job, the best bet would probably be with a company that doesn't have a regular free intern setup. I have heard of this working in some fields, like the upscale culinary world. If you go in and offer to work for free for a while as an apprenticeship, and you keep showing up and prove your worth then it's a pretty sure thing to get job offer once they see the value you bring. Sort of like a working interview.

The problem with this, of course, is if you have bills to pay and no relatives or spouse financing your lifestyle -- in that case, working for free won't cut it.

[anador]

O yes, I just didnt want to risk being a hypocrite... saying that kids should go to trade school instead of college and the service industry....

Yet as an architecture/planning student, I am training to participate in the service industry....

Although in my opinion, with knowledge and design skills that will not be devalued entirely in the future.

[Sixstrings]

Its just sad. Many of these people could have spent their education dollars at a trade school and have a real job that is much more rewarding than some desk job chasing paper.

Not to mention they are spending months working for free and often having to pay their employer for work? Crazy.

One of the true damages the suburban-make-an-easy-bundle-in-the-business-world-mentality has caused is an utter degeneration of the reputation and quality of our trade school system.

It used to be considered a positive and equally respected alternative to college training to simply go out and learn to do something tangible, something with meaning.

Tradeschools are now frowned upon despite the fact there is high demand for skilled and passionate tradespeople.

The result? Middle class kids that have no reason for going to college, no passion, no drive or ambition, going to university just because it is socially obligatory.

They take a major they figure they can make a buck on and then get a job they feel apathetic towards.

Now that the system has broken, there is a high degree of diminished returns on the ever increasing price of education. Yet Kids are still enrolling in these business, management, schools and there is no work once they get out.

Its just sad that the days when you could have an actual skill, do an honest days work, and come home feeling accomplished and useful are apparently gone.

There was an article in the NY Post about this recently. The writer figured it out, that the cost of college has now gotten to the point where you really are better off just investing the money. College education has become ubiquitous. The article points out that professors teach to the degree now, and don't "profess."

To accomodate the college-going masses, courses and standards have been watered down. English language skills among college grads have steadily declined since the 80s. The average degree is literally becoming worthless and meaningless, despite its high cost.

As for the working class in this country, yeah, it's a sad state. The working class made the tansition to working poor beginning in the 80s, when TPTB decided to deindustrialize our nation. This is the old frog in a boiling pot of water scenario -- the people won't really notice if you ease them into poverty over the course of a generation.