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Comment by endianswap | Hacker News Reader

My problem isn't necessarily with unpaid interns, but how the industry treats paid interns. Specifically how it seems like the current industry trend is to hire younger engineers as "interns", even though they've graduated university, in order to treat them as trial/probation employees. I'm not sure what can be done about it, but it's frustrating seeing friends be excited that they got a "real programming job" but are hourly, low-benefits, low-job-security that do the same work as their salaried coworkers but happen to be junior enough to be taken advantage of this way.

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That does seem rather odd. So what if folks offered a salary but also made it strictly probationary up front. Sort of "You are going to be evaluated after 6 months/a year on the job and if you don't meet our expectations you are out." ?

This was essentially what Google to engineers when I worked there. They worked for generally just under a year, got reviewed, and then if they didn't measure up to the "level" that they had hired in at, they let them go. They were somewhat up front about it if you pressed them. But I didn't meet anyone there who particularly appreciated it when others would hire them and not do the whole 'check in a year' thing.

> That does seem rather odd. So what if folks offered a salary but also made it strictly probationary up front. Sort of "You are going to be evaluated after 6 months/a year on the job and if you don't meet our expectations you are out." ?

This is exactly how it works here in Australia, for graduate and "normal" positions alike.

3 months probation with minimal notice, option to extend to 6 (but no greater due to workplace regs). Works well and means the employer doesn't have to take you on as a "casual" just to avoid the risk that you might be shit.

Most states in the US have at-will employment [0]. They don't even need to state a "probationary" period, they can simply fire anyone if they aren't performing.

[0]:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

At my company, this is the algorithm:

  take on interns before graduation
  if graduating within a year
    make hire/no-hire decision by the end of the internship
  else
    make re-intern decision by the end of the internship

Summer internship is a great recruiting channel for us. If we pay them well (not quite at entry level, admittedly), give them a good experience, and a good evaluation, everyone wins, and their full-time destiny is in their hands.

Hopefully fresh CS graduates are not taking contracting jobs with Bigco! From where I sit, they are in a seller's market and shouldn't take so little.

"I'm not sure what can be done about it"

Employee protection laws. A lot of countries have them, mine did too before the neo-libs dismantled it.

The US, of all places, has the laws on the books.

They're ignored.

I'd actually prefer this. I'd rather start at $20/hr for 2 months as a temp employee than be judged on a battery of irrelevant logic questions.

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