Unlike, say, buying a game, most folks can't just decide not to work. If you need to eat, pay rent, child support, need health insurance, or a slew of other things - you can't say no. You must work. Period. The safety net isn't good enough not to take that minimum wage job, especially if you are a childless adult. The only real thing keeping you from being paid less is minimum wage, and that's there because companies aren't fair about hiring practices.

The only reason you were able to work an unpaid internship is because your family not only didn't need you to work, but they also didn't need you to watch younger siblings in your free time. To top it all off, that was offered to you - this isn't a thing most folks can do. Not to mention that unpaid internships are often slavery under a different name. If someone wants to give someone experience or train someone, they should pay.

I wish people would quit acting like the market is fair by any means or like people have a real choice in working. Neither of these things are true with the labor market.

No one is saying you shouldn't work at a job where you think it is unfair compensate to your skill sets.

What I am saying is this, if I think I worth $50/hr and the only offer I got after 2 months of searching is $10/hour. If I desperately need some income, I will take the job and continue my job search. $10/hr is still better than $0. Next job offer may be $30/hr. Then the next one may be $50 or $60.

No one is forcing you to stop looking or improving yourself while you are at a job don't value your skill sets.

It never matters if you think you are worth $50/hour if the skills you have never pay that much in your area. A preschool teacher makes minimum wage or slightly above, despite needing an associates degree. You can be really good, too, but there is only so high that pays. A normal teacher starts out pretty low and if you are in the wrong area, you'll never get paid $50/hr and you'll get lucky to get half that with experience. Lots of jobs never pay a fair wage compared to skill sets. It just doesn't freaking matter most of the time.

The game is rigged. You can be stuck somewhere simply because they have good insurance and your kid is sick. It doesn't matter how good you are. Not everyone can improve themselves in ways that will get them paid more. Even if everyone did this, there are only so many jobs out there and you should hope not to have the disadvantage of wanting free time, time with children, or a health issue that puts any limits on your work.

I challenge you to poke your finger through the massive hole in your argument. I'll give you a hint, it has to do with the resource utilization that you can never buy more of.

> The labor market is a free market. If you don't agree the employer offer is fair, you don't have to accept. When you find a better offer, you go to the better offer.

Not everyone has competitive skill sets. People who work at McDonald’s don’t have much of a choice of where they work. Burger King isn’t going to pay them much better.

> If you are stuck in a minimum wage job, then this is what the market is paying for your skill set. If you think you worth more, then proof it, don't blame the system.

I think what OP was saying is that employers of low-skill workers have a asymmetric power. Because low-skill workers have no where to turn, they are forced to accept low wages and poverty over living in the street, even when their employers can very well afford to pay them more. And because the live in poverty, they cannot afford the time or materials to build skills which lift them out of poverty.

We are going to need service workers for the foreseeable future, not everyone can be a fancy software engineer with marketable skills. Covid has certainly demonstrated this. Are we just going to say “tough shit you should have worked for free when you were a teenager” and let a large portion of the population live in poverty when they don’t have to?

> I don't know if there is any unpaid internship now or if it is even legal now.

They definitely are

> you don't have to accept. When you find a better offer, you go to the better offer.

What if there aren't better offers?

> As for minimum wage, it is hurting the unskilled workers, like high school students, college students who are looking for experience.

The article shows that there isn't conclusive evidence pointing to employment destruction with minimum wage increases.

> If you think you worth more, then proof it, don't blame the system.

If the market can get away with paying less than your worth, it will. That's precisely the point of my argument: companies have more power than workers to negotiate wages.

> When I was in high school, I was working in an unpaid internship to get some experiences. I don't know if there is any unpaid internship now or if it is even legal now.

Don't you see how unpaid internships can be harmful? If you need experience to have a nice job and unpaid internships are a requirement, it means a "forced" period where you are working without income. People without savings won't be able to take those internships and have those better jobs, further locking them in poverty.

> What if there aren't better offers? Death. By exposure, hunger, or thirst.

We must always understand the implication of Libertarian statements. They expect the poor to die when they can't afford shelter, food, or water. Or unless someone else besides them has mercy or compassion.

>> The labor market is not a free market: companies have more power in negotiation, they have more information and, most important of all, they can deal with a job opening not being covered most of the time. Workers can't usually live too much without finding a job.

> The labor market is a free market. If you don't agree the employer offer is fair, you don't have to accept.

You disagreed with him while not actually addressing his point at all. Care to elaborate how you think he's wrong here?

They are arguing about semantics. The labour market is a free market but not a totally efficient market as some participants use their power over demand or supply (huge corporations, unions) to drive different outcomes to a perfectly competitive market where all participants are price-takers.

Unpaid internships are definitely still a thing, and they are yet another way that privileged people have an advantage in society. Not many people can afford to work for free unless they have family wealth to support them, or are willing to go into large amounts of debt. Unpaid internships should probably be illegal to make things more fair.

You can't really respond to an article that says "Here's the conventional wisdom, and here's all the evidence and advanced work that shows why the conventional wisdom is wrong" with "Here's the conventional wisdom."

The labor market ain't free. There's minimum wage, all these regulations around payroll and healthcare. Consider that 40 hours a week is standard... why is that standard? Is it because a majority independently arrived at that same conclusion? Or is it because of overtime laws? Consider the W2 vs 1099 employee, or the fact that you can't purchase healthcare at a competitive rate outside of employment, and employment isn't required to provide that below 30 hours/week.

Doesn't seem very free to me, sounds downright byzantine.