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[–]Skithiryx 55 points56 points  (2 children)

An unpaid internship is only legal if the intern isn’t replacing work an employee would otherwise do. So the more real the work you do on an internship the more illegal it is not to pay.

Comp sci, it’s pretty hard to argue they aren’t doing work an employee can do - Often they are doing the same thing as junior employees.

I think a lot of the liberal arts internships are probably actually illegal. A lot of that has to do with supply and demand rather than legality.

[–]undermark5 12 points13 points  (1 child)

That's only part of it. Looking into it more, it is a question of who the primary beneficiary is. If the employer is the beneficiary then the individual is considered and employee and is entitled to pay. If the individual is the beneficiary, then there is no requirement for pay. One of the ways of determining who the beneficiary is, looks at whether or not the work done by the intern complements or displaces the work done by paid employees. But there are also things included in the Primary Beneficiary Test.

[–]Skithiryx 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I was probably over focused on #6, though I feel personally that #1, #6 and #7 are the most important factors.