During my first year of teaching in London in 1998-1999 I was paid £14,000. I made a net loss and had to approach my bank for a bridging graduate loan to make it through until the next year.
At the same time, I had a friend who started a job in television. He was being paid just £9000 per year. The difference between us was that his parents supported him financially and so he was able to make ends meet.
Over the years, I lost touch with my friend, but the last I heard, he seemed to be doing very well for himself.
To a company, it makes sense to pay as little as possible to new employees, particularly in a sexy sector like the media. Some young people are even prepared to work for free. They can do this because they are privileged. This is not a privilege associated with the colour of their skin, but a privilege that comes from having wealthy parents.
Over time, of course, this distorts sectors like the media. It means that I can listen to a comedy show on BBC radio where the villain in a song about bankers, of all people, has a working class accent and nobody raises an eyebrow. It means that the people who tell our stories are disconnected and out of touch. Think of a media run by the people who make Midsummer Murders.
If you are an employer committed to equality of opportunity and you want to make a real difference, then consider employing young people on merit rather than the depth of their parents’ pockets. That is, after all, the right thing to do.
Filling the pail 
Good point, Greg. I recall in the late 1980s when I was trying to lever myself into paid journalism, I’d write quite a few pieces for free, but I also had paid work to keep me afloat.
These days, the internships seem to be full time and for a series of months … how you pay your bills and look after your basic needs without cashed-up parents while doing that would be tricky if not impossible.
If newbies to professions can do part-time /occasional free work, that’s ok, but in moderation. If it eats up all their available working hours, it’s not a good fit. I know young people who’ve done multiple internships yet are back to zero – no paid work. It’s all about not putting all your eggs in one basket.
Ditch the idea of an unpaid internship if it’s not a good economic fit and send out feelers for volunteer work that’s a better fit. Seek.com has a whole section with such opportunities. One way to bulk up the cvs of emergent professionals.
Part of my master’s thesis was on unpaid internships. Almost everyone I spoke to who was doing an unpaid internship or had done one in the past would have liked to be paid because it would make things a lot easier for them.
One of the stories that stood out to me was one girl who was an intern at a national park – some interns were being paid, but she wasn’t one of them and she had to take on a paying job to make ends meet. She felt horrible hearing everyone else talking about how excited they were to be paid and she felt left out.
I worked as an unpaid intern at a TV station and I had a job and school at the time on top of that. It was definitely a great experience, but being paid would have made things a lot less stressful. I found that not every place counts internships as experience, which is even more frustrating.
Unpaid internships are basically affirmative action for the well off, ensuring that only the well off can work in these positions. If someone is doing work, they should be paid, end of story.