THE TOPSY-TURVY LOGIC OF PAYING YOUNG PEOPLE FOR THEIR LABOUR
An unpaid ‘work experience’ scheme by Pret a Manger was slammed at the weekend – the public backlash was so strong that the sandwich chain was forced to perform a U-turn and pledge that the 16- to 18-year-olds who take part will be paid for their work after all.
While Graduate Fog was pleased to see this – and impressed by Pret’s swift correction of this error of judgement – we were left a little puzzled. (No doubt many of our graduate readers were too). After all, many of you are doing unpaid, graduate internships involving far more skilled work and of a much greater length (months, not weeks), particularly in politics, media, fashion and charity. Yet stories about these rarely attract the press coverage and public attention the Pret a Manger internships story received. When the employee is young, is low-skilled work somehow considered more worthy of pay than higher-skilled work?
As this website’s founder Tanya de Grunwald told the Guardian, the best way to teach young people about the value of work is to pay them a wage for their labour. Not only is this the law, but to do anything less risks distorting young people’s attitudes to work, and skewing their understanding of the responsibilities that an employee and employer have to one another. Pay clarifies this relationship, setting clear expectations on both sides. At Graduate Fog, we believe this should be the case whether the worker is making sandwiches for Pret a Manger, running Oxfam’s social media channels or writing stories for a national newspaper.
Yet the Pret a Manger internships story, involving younger workers (16-18), doing shorter placements (2 weeks) and less skilled work (including making sandwiches) clearly caught the public and press attention more than any stories we have seen recently about graduate-level unpaid internships. Why was this? Is low-skilled work somehow more obviously worthy of pay – while higher skilled work can be viewed as a learning experience? Or did the press and the public simply jump at the chance to make an example of Pret a Manger? We’d love to know what you think, so please throw in your thoughts below…
* ARE SANDWICH-MAKING PLACEMENTS MORE PAY-WORTHY THAN SKILLED, GRADUATE INTERNSHIPS?
How do you explain the backlash against Pret a Manger’s work experience placement, when tens of thousands of graduates are doing far more skilled work for free?
When writing the headline, it struck me that there may be something about the perceived ‘sexiness’ about the employer or type of work that impacts the outrage factor and / or the public’s perception of whether it should be paid. Like the more desirable the profession or the more exciting the work, the less essential it is that is be paid. This factor seems to trump both the skill or experience level of the worker, the person’s age, and the length of the placement. Hmm. It’s a theory… What do others think?
For me, the Pret story garnered a justified amount of attention because it was proposed that the solution to replacing paid staff was offering unpaid work experience to kids. Regardless of whataboutery in relation to graduate level internships, this just didn’t feel right.
By all means pay a 16 year old with no experience less to make sandwiches or clear tables – NMW allows this after all – but don’t try fob off a paid job as a training opportunity!
I think you are right regarding the ‘sexiness’ point Tanya
I applied for a few internships in PR during the worst of the last recession as I was so desperate to break in.
I’ve come to realise what a complete lack of self-respect it showed on my part. If I didn’t value my own labour how could I expect anyone else to?
I am on annual leave today working in a completely unrelated field. Now the concept of working for free now seems laughable. I am motivated by earning a wage not by working for free.
Agreed, though on one point:
Is making sandwiches, cappuccinos, mochas for hoardes of office workers really “less skilled” than sitting at a desk or in a Pret and tweeting and writing other social media content?
Maybe less prestigious is a better description? When they are paid, baristas and low level white collar workers often get paid about the same.
And I know which I find easier out of the two.
I guess maybe the sexiness point you make sort of covers what I said though Taya.
As I said on Facebook I was very surprised how quickly this was reversed.
Maybe Pret’s other mistake was to announce publicly what many other companies don’t exactly shout to the rafters. Unless a journo got hold of it?