Unpaid internships are costing job seekers $6,000 each, with interns working for free for nine weeks on average, according to a new survey. 

Dimity Mannering, executive director of Interns Australia, a support and advocacy organisation, said, “Unpaid internships are increasingly common and … young people feel they have no option but to work for free”.

According to the Interns Australia 2015 Annual Survey, the problem is getting worse with the increasing graduate population. Despite the expectation of paid work, almost 80 percent of interns did not receive a job offer from the host company.

More than 86 percent received no pay or were paid below the minimum wage. More than half of survey respondents had completed multiple internships.

“The total time the average intern reported spending in internship placements was 45 days. This means that the average unpaid intern in Australia forfeits $5913.18 in wages”, the survey noted. 

The arts, not-for-profits, media and law were the industries in which internships are most common.

Federal legislation stipulates that interns can be unpaid only if the work they perform contributes directly to course credits or study requirements. If it does not, they should be counted as employees and paid as such.

“For employers to comply with the Fair Work Act, roughly the same number of people who completed an internship outside their studies [60 percent] should have been remunerated. Only 12.72 per cent of internships were remunerated, suggesting that most unpaid internships are completed outside the bounds of the Fair Work Act”, the survey said.

In other words, interns are being ripped off by companies that flout labour laws.

“The only reason companies can give unpaid internships is because they know that young people are so desperate for experience that we will do anything to get it”, one respondent said.