I think that the idea of unpaid internships somehow widening the gaps between classes can easily be shown as unfounded. An internship could cost as much as $4,000, which was stated in the original article. College, on the other hand, can cost $10,000-$20,000 a semester! A $4,000 internship, or an unpaid internship, can not put middle/lower class students at a disadvantage any more so that “college” as an institution already does. There are grants, scholarships, financial aid, etc for college to help these students attend school, just like internships that you don’t have to pay for are available.

There are many benefits to completing unpaid internships while in college that I feel are being ignored here. I’m not naive in thinking that people don’t work hard for the all mighty dollar, but having to begin in your field unpaid takes money out of the equation. If you don’t like doing your job unpaid, you are eventually going to hate to do it paid, too. I like how unpaid internships takes money out of the game and concentrates strictly on the actual JOB. Even if you are getting coffee and opening mail you can still observe what a person with your degree might be doing. I think it’s absolutely necessary to have this experience before jumping into a job market. A lot of college students have no idea what the “real world” is like in their field until they dive in after graduation. Sometimes it isn’t what they had hoped for!

As a poor graduate student who paid for her internship as an undergraduate (and then was HIRED afterwards) I understand how unpaid internships reek of the big bad man pinching every dollar he can out of you. I have come to believe, though, that this is not the case in the majority of fields and that there are a lot of benefits that are being ignored by the critics!!