(Montreal) Interns should be paid for their work, argues the Institute for Socioeconomic Research and Information (IRIS). This would not be the case for the vast majority of internships (84%), according to its report published Thursday.
For the left-wing think tank, the internship is not only a learning activity, but also a job. Interns should therefore be paid accordingly.
Free internships are generally justified by the fact that the employer must devote resources to supervising the intern, who is inexperienced. Employer participation can also be seen as a service, by contributing to the training of the next generation.
IRIS researcher Julia Posca believes that this argument devalues the intern’s contribution to the employer’s activities, regardless of whether they are in the public or private sector. “There is work that is carried out during the internship,” she defends in an interview. It is wrong to say that no work is being done. »
The obligation to do an unpaid internship can also increase the precariousness of students. “Often, students will find themselves having to leave their job, precisely because their internship will take up the majority of their time. So, they will find themselves without income. Obviously, for many people, it is not possible not to have an income. This is why there is debt. »
The amounts paid by scholarships are often not enough to equal the minimum wage when the hours spent on the internship are taken into account, adds Ms. Posca.
IRIS estimates that paying interns would cost the government between 388 million and 501.5 million, as an employer. For the private sector, this would represent a cost of between 173.5 million and 237 million.
Ms. Posca does not believe that the obligation to pay interns would cause a significant number of companies to stop offering internships. She adds that the government already provides financial support to companies that have interns.
In 2019, 5,954 companies benefited from the refundable tax credit for work placements. The cost of this tax measure is expected to be nearly 70 million in 2023.
IRIS does not take a position on whether it would be better to pay remuneration in the form of a salary or a scholarship.
Disadvantaged women
Based on various data on student profiles, IRIS concludes that women are at a disadvantage when it comes to unpaid internships.
The study highlights that 74% of college interns were women while this proportion is 64% at university. IRIS underlines that health and education, predominantly female, are two of the three areas where the most university internships are carried out.
“The non-remuneration of interns is thus seen as a phenomenon reinforcing the devaluation of social reproduction tasks, which are typically carried out by women and which, on the labor market, are associated with jobs occupied mainly by women and on average less well paid”, deplores the IRIS in its report.