That's because they're not really "interns" they're just "software developers who are not old enough to actually hire yet because they're still finishing up the traditional college experience"

"[...] not old enough to actually hire yet because they're still finishing up the traditional college experience"

Isn't that exactly the definition of what an intern is?

Yeah, notice how I said "software developers" though. That makes this a lot different than people in other professions...

Software developers interns do software developing related stuff, just as lawyers interns are do law related stuff, and so on. Apart from different market prices for their respective labour, I'm failing to see the difference between supposedly "real" internships and "false" internships according to your definition.

The difference that I see is that a software development intern can occasionally provide an immense level of value immediately upon being hired, whereas many in traditional internships are really just glorified office managers. Just from my experience doing internships in the music business.

For that matter, I've done internships at two of the companies on that list, and currently work for a third.

The full-year-equivalent for my intern salary was ~$80k, at both. (Counting housing stipend.)

However, at least in my field (geoscience), an "intern" means someone who has already completed at least a B.S. and is currently enrolled in a graduate program. You _can't_ do an internship as an undergraduate.

It's not uncommon to have interns in their 30's who have >10 years experience with very similar work to job they're doing as an intern. (To be fair, it's also common to have people who are doing very unrelated graduate work and have no experience with what they're doing as interns.)

At least in my case, I had already completed a B.S., M.S., and was a few years into my PhD at the time.

At any rate, keep in mind that a lot of these internship programs don't allow undergraduates. I'm not saying they're not cushy (they are!), but they're basically 3-month paid interviews.

I can certainly say with confidence that 9 of the top 10 companies do hire undergraduates readily. ( Not sure about Exxon ).

Happy Apping :)

I should have clarified that. I mean in geoscience. As far as I know, none of the majors accept undergraduate geoscience interns.

At any rate, the point I was trying to make is that the average salaries include quite a few (majority even? I dont' know...) folks in graduate programs.

They left out all the law firm summer clerks. Also a number of interns at these companies are graduate students.

A cheap recruiting tool for these companies. Get top recruits through the door when the difference in a few K still matters to them.

I wonder if a fair portion of that is a housing stipend so the student can relocate for the short duration of the internship.

I don't think so. Most of them give a separate housing stipend in addition to this.

It's worth noting, at least for the companies on this list that I've interned at, that the listed numbers look like it they are for a well qualified software engineer (with at least a summer or two of industry experience prior to the internship), an MBA student, or a MS/PhD student. In my experience, the actual intern salary at these companies is significantly lower (about 60% the listed salary on average).

christ, I was asked about this and said $25 per hour or 70k per year.