(comments on Marco’s Unpaid internships post)
Marco is correct.
The intention of such programs is generally well-meaning, but the actual results are always damaging. A $5 minimum wage is essentially a ban on the lowest-skilled workers, and negative residual effects abound.
Study economics & history to observe the actual results of these programs.
In Australia, our apprentices actually get paid. Not a lot mind you, but enough for the bare essentials and it goes up every year until they are qualified. Our minimum wage is a lot higher than $5 an hour (what the fuck IS that?), we get paid trainee wages, most university internships are paid, and even high school students doing work experience earn actual money (it was $5 a day when i was in high school.) Oh, and we also have a pretty decent system in Australia where the government pays us money to go to school. Not a lot, but enough for, once again, the bare essentials.
The American system is fucked up.
At the end of the day people work to earn money so they can feed, clothe and house themselves. They do not work for the fucking “experience” of it or for the “fun” of it. Employers really need to get out of that mindset. Work is always just a means to an end. And hey, sometimes it can be something enjoyable or your passion but you still need to eat.
Well said, Jessica. Even $5/hour leaves someone working 40 hours a week with $200 to live off - near-impossible as a single person, let alone someone supporting a family. To suggest that low-skilled workers should be paid even less, especially when the person advocating it is a millionaire entrepeneur living in an expensive part of Manhattan (a tautology, perhaps), is just sick.
Not to mention that the sorts of jobs that pay minimum wage tend not to be jobs people do for “the fun of it”. Flipping burgers at Maccas, anyone?