Internships and the FLSA

Internships have become more common, but there’s debate over whether interns should be paid. The law is unclear on who qualifies as an “employee” and is entitled to minimum wage and overtime pay. Courts look at the “economic reality” of the relationship to decide if someone is an employee under the law. There are exceptions to the law that exclude certain groups, and one of these exceptions is for trainees. This article focuses on that exclusion. This article talks about the trainee exception, which allows interns to work for free under certain conditions. There is controversy over whether this exception should still apply to modern interns. The U.S. Department of Labor has a test to determine trainee status, but its application is debated. The article ends by discussing the future of internships in light of these issues. In 1947, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that trainees at a railroad yard were not considered employees under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), even though they were required to undergo training before being hired. The Court said that the trainees were not entitled to minimum wages because they were not promised any compensation for their training. This decision became important again over 50 years later when there was a debate over unpaid internships and concerns about potential exploitation of students. In the Glatt v. Fox Searchlight Pictures case, two interns were found to be considered employees under the law. This decision caused a lot of other companies in the media, entertainment, and publishing industries to face lawsuits and settlements over intern claims. The Department of Labor’s test for determining if an intern is actually an employee is being closely looked at in light of this case. The DOL Six-factor Test is a set of six criteria that determine if an internship should be paid or unpaid. These factors include things like whether the intern is doing work that benefits them, if they are supervised, and if they are being trained in a way similar to an educational environment. The 11th Circuit and federal courts in Florida have used this test to decide whether interns should be paid or not, and have sometimes granted employers the right to have unpaid interns even if they don’t meet all six factors. The court didn’t agree with the Department of Labor’s six-factor test and instead used a “primary benefit” test in a case involving students at Laurelbrook School. The school gave vocational training to its students, and the court had to decide if the students were covered by labor laws. Laurelbrook was a school founded by Seventh-day Adventists in 1950. The school offered grades nine through twelve and a nursing home for practical training. The school was sued for child labor violations, but the court ruled in favor of the school. The court rejected the six-factor test used to determine employee status and instead focused on who benefits the most from the relationship. The primary-benefit test has been used by other courts and industry groups. Internships may be exempt from minimum wage and overtime laws if they are part of a college program and provide hands-on learning related to the student’s course of study. The internship should benefit the student and not displace paid workers, and the employer should not receive immediate economic benefit from the intern’s work. There should be no promise of a job or expectation of payment. This means that if an internship is part of a college program and follows these rules, it is likely to be exempt from minimum wage and overtime laws. Internships aren’t going away, but companies need to be careful about following the law. Government and non-profit internships are generally allowed without pay. Some people think this isn’t fair, but it’s a different issue. The government is looking into giving more guidance on internships in these areas, but nothing has been decided yet. The passage discusses the importance of following the six factors to avoid interns being classified as employees. It also mentions the Fair Labor Standards Act and provides some legal cases as examples. It concludes with some resources and opinions on unpaid internships. This text discusses the legalities of unpaid internships. It includes references to court cases and Department of Labor guidelines. The Department of Labor has a fact sheet that lists six criteria for determining whether an unpaid intern should be considered an employee. It also mentions specific court cases where interns sued for unpaid wages and the outcomes of those cases. The text also includes references to academic studies and amicus briefs filed in support of neither party in a specific court case. This is a bunch of legal citations talking about whether interns should be paid for their work. It includes opinions from the Wage and Hour Division and court cases discussing the benefits to the employer and the educational nature of the intern’s work. The Department of Labor says that interns should primarily benefit from the experience and not do work that an employee would normally do. Some court cases have different opinions on when interns should be paid. The American Bar Association has rules that say law schools can’t give credit to students who are paid for their work. Also, there are laws about who can volunteer without getting paid, and a lawyer wrote a paper about how these laws should apply to interns at nonprofits and public agencies. The author of this article is a lawyer who specializes in labor and employment law.

Source: https://www.floridabar.org/the-florida-bar-journal/internships-and-the-flsa/