I’m not even sure this one counts as an interview. Maybe a spam phone interview.
So I’ve been working at a doc review position recently. Mostly so that I can buy food and whatnot. Anyway, I’m fast approaching the 2K rejections point. So imagine my joy when someone called me up and asked if I was still interested in the job I submitted a resume to. So we made a bit of smalltalk and they told me where it was located; over on the eastern seaboard. Okay so far. I’d have to move but it was definitely doable. Then they tell me they are actually a staffing firm; crap, the hair on the back of my neck pricks up. And then they start explaining what the job is… 6 months potentially extendable yada yada.. and then they say what I was already guessing. Contract work. I’m already assuming they are looking for doc reviewers at this point and they’re trying like hell to make it sound like something more. So I play along, and ask the next obvious question, how much is it paying. $17 an hour. The phone interviewer knew something was wrong from the slightly too long silence.
I calmly explained I am living in one of the more depressed legal markets in the country, and I am making a decent amount more than that already. In a very crappy legal environment. In one of the cheaper places to live in the country. I also mention that I know for a fact the lowest paid interns in the city she mentioned make $15 an hour. Because I happen to know several city prosecutors there… and the city pays their interns at the lowest rate in the city; $15. I also tell her $17 is so far below any livable salary in that particular city, its damn near laughable. So I say, thanks but no thanks. I really don’t need to move to a much more expensive city, to work for a lot less money, and to be paid on par with an intern.
Thanks Fountain Group. Maybe next time you’ll offer me the Asst. manager position of a McDonalds.