Yes- but the difference is that people on this forum seem to believe that they entitled to higher pay. They are still trainees! Should your professors pay you for having a highschool diploma?
I think if you work a full time professional job you're entitled to a full time professional wage, trainee or no. The lack of reasonable livable pay is driving future talent away from the field.
The average pay for an entry-level co-op in Cincinnati's program is about $15 per hour, maybe a few bucks more in the larger cities and for co-op students who already have some experience. If your billing rate for that person doesn't include enough overhead to account for some training, then you're a shitty businessperson. If you don't want to pay somebody that much, then you're a shitty employer. Entry-level interns aren't expecting to get rich during their first few years, but being able to pay rent and buy groceries shouldn't be an unreasonable expectation.
Entry with a M.Arch in my area is between $40k to $50k/year (This is Ontario, so it's fancy Canadian money). That's $19 to $24 per hour. Techs and interior designers also fall somewhere in the lower part of that range.
Not breaking the bank and not the 6-fig number people cry foul about, but it's manageable if you we'rent dumb enough to take out $200k in student loans.
Why are you against fair wages Bulgar? Don't give me the whole "well I was paid pennies and paid my dues!" crap. You aren't supposed to make things worse for future generations, you are supposed to help rectify the things you hated when you went through it, unless you are a spiteful bastard.
Bulgar's attitude reminds me of a boss I (very briefly) had in NYC after grad school:
He paid pathetic, lowball wages in one of the most expensive cities on the planet, even though he could afford to live in a luxury high-rise and drive a high-end car to work each day. (Pretty sure he had no clue the subway even existed.)
He only hired entry-level interns because they were cheap and easy to bully.
He'd get frustrated because these same entry-level interns didn't have the knowledge and experience of senior-level architects.
He refused to support professional development in any manner because he saw it as a threat to his own authority.
And naturally, he'd throw a child-like temper tantrum whenever somebody left his firm after landing a better job, and he could never figure out why it was so hard to hire people and retain them.
I actually love to teach and mentor. But I believe that while there will always be a need for mentoring, you can't be content with complete incompetence when you hire someone. You can't graduate from school and only have Photoshop skills. That's as if you never studied architecture and just studied film/animation/graphic design.
Also- once hired, chances are that others who are significantly above your pay-grade will be coming up with all the designs and you will mostly be in production. So your skills attained through school will practically be useless. You are not hired to design; you are hired to produce.
So if they graduate, they're not even good enough for production, unless they get a job offer at BIG, in which case they're only good for producing at that office, who don't know how to produce, except that they work at big, so they only produce stuff that isn't worth anything, unless the team they're on wins the commission, in which case they can't produce the CD anyways for the project, so they're not entitled to a decent wage regardless, which they never actually asked for in this thread in the first place...
I'll just assume you're a baby-boomer/Gen.X'er then? *Go blog about it on your FaceSpace sonny!*
Let's look at it this way, irregardless of the pay, it all goes down to what you want in your career. Some architects want to be full rounded and pragmatic, while others who aspire to be full-on designers would go thru the path that you are offered. Let's all face it, branding is still prevalent in architecture as with everything else.
^ Bench. I assumed you haven't worked for a starchitect before. Because that statement is just utter b.s. unless you're just being sarcastic. Of course these interns will learn along the way.
Internship at BIG
Is that not what IDP is intended to be?
Yes- but the difference is that people on this forum seem to believe that they entitled to higher pay. They are still trainees! Should your professors pay you for having a highschool diploma?
I think if you work a full time professional job you're entitled to a full time professional wage, trainee or no. The lack of reasonable livable pay is driving future talent away from the field.
The average pay for an entry-level co-op in Cincinnati's program is about $15 per hour, maybe a few bucks more in the larger cities and for co-op students who already have some experience. If your billing rate for that person doesn't include enough overhead to account for some training, then you're a shitty businessperson. If you don't want to pay somebody that much, then you're a shitty employer. Entry-level interns aren't expecting to get rich during their first few years, but being able to pay rent and buy groceries shouldn't be an unreasonable expectation.
Bulgar: what do you think is a fair starting wage for 'trainees'?
Entry with a M.Arch in my area is between $40k to $50k/year (This is Ontario, so it's fancy Canadian money). That's $19 to $24 per hour. Techs and interior designers also fall somewhere in the lower part of that range.
Not breaking the bank and not the 6-fig number people cry foul about, but it's manageable if you we'rent dumb enough to take out $200k in student loans.
Why are you against fair wages Bulgar? Don't give me the whole "well I was paid pennies and paid my dues!" crap. You aren't supposed to make things worse for future generations, you are supposed to help rectify the things you hated when you went through it, unless you are a spiteful bastard.
Bulgar's attitude reminds me of a boss I (very briefly) had in NYC after grad school:
He paid pathetic, lowball wages in one of the most expensive cities on the planet, even though he could afford to live in a luxury high-rise and drive a high-end car to work each day. (Pretty sure he had no clue the subway even existed.)
He only hired entry-level interns because they were cheap and easy to bully.
He'd get frustrated because these same entry-level interns didn't have the knowledge and experience of senior-level architects.
He refused to support professional development in any manner because he saw it as a threat to his own authority.
And naturally, he'd throw a child-like temper tantrum whenever somebody left his firm after landing a better job, and he could never figure out why it was so hard to hire people and retain them.
David/Josh-
I actually love to teach and mentor. But I believe that while there will always be a need for mentoring, you can't be content with complete incompetence when you hire someone. You can't graduate from school and only have Photoshop skills. That's as if you never studied architecture and just studied film/animation/graphic design.
Also- once hired, chances are that others who are significantly above your pay-grade will be coming up with all the designs and you will mostly be in production. So your skills attained through school will practically be useless. You are not hired to design; you are hired to produce.
No one is suggesting we need to hire all the incompetent people out there.
You can't graduate from school and only have Photoshop skills.
Do these graduates exist? I've never met one, but maybe I'm just lucky.
I got to design the first week on the job. I didn't know CAD so I couldn't do that.
So if they graduate, they're not even good enough for production, unless they get a job offer at BIG, in which case they're only good for producing at that office, who don't know how to produce, except that they work at big, so they only produce stuff that isn't worth anything, unless the team they're on wins the commission, in which case they can't produce the CD anyways for the project, so they're not entitled to a decent wage regardless, which they never actually asked for in this thread in the first place...
I'll just assume you're a baby-boomer/Gen.X'er then? *Go blog about it on your FaceSpace sonny!*
Let's look at it this way, irregardless of the pay, it all goes down to what you want in your career. Some architects want to be full rounded and pragmatic, while others who aspire to be full-on designers would go thru the path that you are offered. Let's all face it, branding is still prevalent in architecture as with everything else.
^ Bench. I assumed you haven't worked for a starchitect before. Because that statement is just utter b.s. unless you're just being sarcastic. Of course these interns will learn along the way.
go for BIG if you can afford it- period.
"if you can afford it"
ugh.
Of course its sarcastic - and I do currently work inside that realm...
^ sorry Bench but I couldnt tell when my browsers an inch wide snuck at the corner of my screen at the office.but touche' on your job
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