Unpaid internship = Unpaid Labor

Summer is almost over, and soon, school is about to resume in full swing. Now, summer is the season for vacations, relaxing at the beach, and for students, an ideal time to intern at a reputable firm in order to acquire the skills in one's required field. But some shady employers, realizing the desperation of some students usually resort to inhumane tactics of free labor.

The television and radio stations, despite the glamor associated with it, has to be one of the worst places for a fresher to intern with. Some of these places offer absolutely no remittance to their intern and others would gladly give you a class credit in lieu of laboring for them. It would not be a bad idea, if they needed a part time intern with little remittance. Some do work full time, but to require that a student put in 8 hours a day for 5 days a week for absolutely no pay for the next three months is just insane and inhumane. The government should look into it. How about a law being drafted that interns ought to be compensated for their jobs at a company. Compensating them with minimum wage is a slap on the face, be it in California, notorious for its high cost of living, or some other state where the standard of living may be manageable.

It gets worse with the stratospheric cost of an education, coupled with high interest rates on student loans and worse of it all, no guarantee of a job after school. If the government is so insistent on making education a priority for the citizens, then they should also insist that interns ought to be taken care of in their respective organizations. When one thinks of an unpaid intern, the title, "Indentured servant" comes to mind. Already, there are some students who may be forced to bypass the internship route in place of a regular job to pay their bills.

And the gap between the rich and the poor gets wider and wider.