May 22, 2026
As college students start their summer internships, companies should keep in mind what attorneys say are the hallmarks of running a smooth program: appropriate work for interns and proper compensation.
While companies can run unpaid internship programs if the work performed primarily benefits the intern and involves training, interns should be paid if the work they’re doing is substituting the work of an employee, attorneys told Law360.
. . .
Here, Law360 shares three tips to keep this summer’s paid and unpaid internship programs compliant with the law.
Labels Alone Won’t Protect You
The work that interns perform, not how their internships are labeled, determines whether the work performed during a summer internship should be compensated.
If the work performed replaces that of an employee, if it doesn’t have a defined purpose toward their academics, and if it doesn’t count for college credit, that work should be paid, said Rebecca Ojserkis, a worker-side attorney at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.
In that case, the intern would need to get paid the full minimum wage under either federal or state law, even if their internship is technically considered unpaid, Ojserkis said.
“The one thing for interns to keep in mind, and employers as well, is that labels don’t matter,” she said.