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Discussion on: Help me understand unpaid internships!

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Sorin Costea

(There might be a correlation between the unpaid internship and the smallest minimum wages in the respective country, as a concept that being able to work is a privilege or something?) I see a lot of opinions floating around that as an intern you tap into that company's pool of knowledge and coaching and whatnot, so your internship wouldn't be free work but a valuable training bootcamp. Now if this was the case, the I'd fully agree to the unpaid internship as a huge trampoline to success. But really, IS THIS THE CASE? Reality check please. Are your interns really that dumb that they don't produce anything of use? Are your interns so privileged that they are all day pairing with your greatest developers? I don't think so. Reality is probably somewhere in between, so their pay should also be somewhere in between, recognizing that interns are humans too who need to put food on their tables, that Udemy is just as good as your star ninja coaches and your company is not really Cambridge.