Duolingo 101: Everything you need to know!

One of the many benefits of learning another language: more sweets! (Also a preview of a Blog to come)

***Scroll down for the tutorial!***

With each language comes its bias

With the New Year approaching, I thought I would do my best to enable as many people as possible to find success with their language endeavors and resolutions! Thus, here is my all-encompassing guide to using Duolingo (and a bit of other resources) to learn a language!

For some background, I have now finished four courses on Duolingo: Japanese, Spanish, French and Dutch. I already had background knowledge exceeding the first two and I took French 101 at university concurrently with starting the French course. Dutch was the only language I learned exclusively through Duolingo. The French course took me 11 months and Dutch about two years. Over that time I have also flirted with the Czech course before a weekend in Prague and am currently working on the Hindi, Swahili and Mandarin courses.

In this post I will also draw upon my experience learning languages in other settings such as work, travel, one-on-one exchange partners, university and high school to give the best advice I can about how to succeed in learning a language and how to use Duolingo to help that process. Though the courses I have taken cover many continents and language families, keep in mind my advice could be less accurate for languages I have not tried.


In the following guide, I will explain what Duolingo is and what exactly it has to offer. Then, I will teach you how to use Duolingo properly as it can be a bit unintuitive and has many hidden features. Finally, I will give my opinions and recommendations. Let's go!

Note: different features are available on different platforms and even among individuals, so beware. The website is the most similar for everyone and can be accessed through your phone's web browser.

The email campaigns can get quite... intense, lending itself to many memes

Imagine the possibilities with this one

What is Duolingo?

Duolingo is a free(ish) language learning platform that comprises a website and applications on all major platforms. I say -ish because you truly pay for Duolingo with either a paid premium subscriptions or through ads that run after each lesson in the costless version.

Duolingo offers 87 languages courses including 3 constructed languages, but if you're reading this as an English-speaker then you have about 34 real options. Some of those 34 are in Beta, meaning they may not have all the features of the completed courses, contain bugs and are much shorter. In order of popularity are:

• Spanish
• French
• German
• Japanese
• Italian
• Korean
• Chinese (Mandarin)
• Russian
• Portuguese
• Turkish
• Dutch
• Swedish
• Greek
• Irish
• Hebrew
• Polish
• Norwegian (Bokmål)
• High Valyrian (from Game of Thrones)
• Vietnamese
• Danish
• Romanian
• Swahili
• Hindi
• Klingon (from Star Wars)
• Swahili
• Esperanto (constructed international auxiliary language) 
• Hungarian
• Welsch
• Ukrainian
• Czech
• Hawaiian (Beta)
• Indonesian (Beta)
• Navajo (Beta)
• Arabic (not yet available, ETA May 2019)
  

And if you speak Spanish, you can also learn:

• Guaraní
• Catalan

See anything you like?

What you might not know about Duolingo is that it also has active forum, words, lab, story, and podcast sections. I will discuss more about these sections and how to use them in the next section.

How do you use Duolingo?

First, you create an account and choose your target language. If you have previous experience with the language, you can utilize the placement test and test-out features to reach an appropriate level. From there, we need to learn about bubbles and crowns wait what?

In the above photo are five bubbles, each containing a 'skill' full of individual lessons. Each lesson takes a few minutes to complete and each skill has anywhere from two to nine lessons on the first go around. After you complete the skill, you will get a 'crown' and the bubble will turn from the purple shade you see above to the blue shade and a crown icon will appear in the corner. For each 'crown' you can redo the skill with more lessons and harder questions for a maximum of 5 crowns. This is a good, but not great (more on that in the next section), visual representation of how well the skills are embedded into your mind. To unlock more skills, you have to complete all the skills you currently have available to at least the first crown level.

Questions

Within each lesson are a variety of questions which become more or less frequent depending on your crown level and, frustratingly, the platform you are using. Also, the most important thing to know is that YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO KNOW THE YELLOW WORDS. Click or tap on them to learn. If you assume you are supposed to answer the questions as is, like I did at first, you will lose your mind.

Anyway, here are the different types of questions you will encounter ranked, in my opinion, from best to work in terms of developing skill are:

Word unscramble translations

I don't like these because they focus your eyes on text in your native language and do not require anything more than a basic understanding of the sentence and a good understanding of word order in your native language.

Multiple choice

These are better because they focus your attention on text in the target language, but still fall short for me because they are easy and by design contain two incorrect sentences you must read for every correct sentence. These are much better when they ask you the correct conjugation out of all possible conjugations (all of which are correct but innappropriate), but these only show up in certain versions.

Unscrambling audio dictation

If the blocks are in the target language, this gets a pass from me because spelling and understanding speech are skills that can be developed separately, but I still prefer typing out and do not support the idea of staring at words in your target language and moving them around.

Translating into/from target language

Good. 

Keep in mind, however, that translating and learning a language are two very different skills and one should focus more on understanding, especially as languages are farther linguistically from your native language.

Character-based questions

These also exist, and some are better than others, but I don't want to spend much time on them since most languages on Duolingo don't use them and only Chinese and Japanese will continue to use them after the beginning of the course.

Speaking

Yessss! Sometimes a bit off on recognition, but it will let you through if you keep trying. I believe this feature is only available on mobile or for limited languages, which is unfortunate. However, speaking is really a skill that should be developed with a partner. I will develop upon these opinions in the next section.

Rote audio dictation in target language

The perfect lesson for the role Duolingo plays in language learning, especially because it gives you a translation at the end. This engages your knowledge of the language, spelling, and exposes you to the sounds and flow of the language, the key to success.

Pro tip: you can often manually disable the disaster that is the unscramble option by clicking the "show keyboard option." Unfortunately it seems this feature is not available on all platforms.

This so far has covered what you will see in the skills bubbles. You can also click the 'practice' button, represented by a dumbbell in the bottom right corner on mobile, to enter a pseudo-SRS (spaced repetition system) review of a skill randomly selected based upon your activity on the app. This is essential to long term learning unless you go back and review religiously. On the website, there is an even better feature:

Here you see two practice options. I left choice is almost identical to practicing with the bubbles. The right side is an amazing, gameshow-esque timed quiz where you start with 00:30 seconds and gain time with correct answers. The practice ends when you run out of time or answer 20 questions (right and wrong combined). This is by far the best feature as it mimics real life scenarios and help you to overcome what I call the tip-of-the-tongue problem that develops with too much solitary or reading-based practice.

Test-out and Tips

These are by far the most important features on Duolingo. At the moment, they are fully available on the website and partially rolled out on most languages. You can access them from clicking or tapping on the bubble and not immediately selecting the practice feature.

Tips

These are grammar explanations or further information that make up for the weaknesses of Duolingo's game-like instruction system. These range in quality from a few sentences clearing things up to extensive grammar tables and explanations that rival a textbook. These are essential to using Duolingo to learn a language.

Test-out

This allows you to skip a crown level with a simple test. Get four questions wrong and you get nothing! Unless you're using this to get to an appropriate level given your background knowledge, you have to be careful with this feature as Duolingo's weaknesses can allow you to develop a false sense of ability through these. This is different from the keys in between the bubbles which let you skip entire sections of the course with a similar testing layout.

Course management

You can add as many languages as you desire at any time both on web and mobile. Though many language learners have intense opinions about learning multiple languages at once, I know through personal experience it is at the very least possible both in theory and on Duolingo. You can also remove languages you no longer want to study or reset your progress on courses you either want to give a fresh start to for any reason. This can be accessed in the settings tab on the website and on some other platforms.

XP goals

This has to do with your 'daily streak' and is evaluated based upon how much practice you do. One lesson is almost always 10xp, for scale. I will discuss my opinions and recommendations on using this system to your advantage in the next section.

Emails/reminders

You can change the time they appear each day or turn them off via the settings tab on the website.

My recommendations 

Duolingo is a fantastic resource, especially given the price. unfortunately, it is not going to single-handedly get you from zero to fluent. Further, even at the beginner stages of your Duolingo course it would be enormously beneficial to supplement your language learning with other resources or specific strategies that may not be intuitive. In this section, I will provide some of those strategies and resources and will touch upon differences depending on which language you are learning.

Don't use Duolingo how it wants you to use it, aim for better understanding than the questions demand

The mission statement of Duolingo is to make language learning fun and free, not effective. That doesn't mean it you can't add that in with a bit of modification to the default strategy. After all, no one can be taught a second language; one learns a second language. Here are some tips.

These can be hard and will take a lot of getting used to, but will improve your skills much faster and much more effectively. To do this, I recommend adding the following rules to you use, at least from time to time.

Never use the unscramble optionLike I said above, it focuses your attention on what you already know and will teach you to cheat instead of use your target language.

Close your eyes and listen to the sentences being spoken first, even if it's not an audio question

This will help your comprehension. If you can, try to answer the question without reading it. When you read, you are allowed to take more time and may recognize words based on similarity to your native language. Just listening is harder and will make you better. Plus, if you can't get it you always have the option of answering the questions normally afterwards.

The 'hovering technique'

Ok in all honesty I stole this photo from Duolingo's Instagram because my current strategy is a little different, but this is still very effective. This strategy both looks nice and helps you use spaced repetition in your learning, the most effective way of adding things like vocabulary and grammar to your long-term memory. I mentioned that the practice feature is a pseudo-SRS earlier, so let me explain that here. This is not a true SRS because it does not take into account feedback such as how easy or hard the questions were and tests you based upon your activity on the app, not your knowledge. Other apps, which I recommend below, are much better at this. The hover method makes up for the flawed SRS and also prevents you from steamrolling a bunch of new material while forgetting everything else.

Use timed practice

If you want to say you can "speak" a language, you will probably have to speak, right? This feature is the best preparation for that, even more so than the speaking practice. Why? Because the speaking practice makes you read a script. The timed practice makes you think on your feet, sink or swim, and moves all that language knowledge from the dusty recesses of the back of your mind straight to the front, where you can use it easily.

Look up grammar independently

If you read the tips (or if they don't exist) and still don't get it, it won't get better. Search the name of the skill and language and something should come up!

Consistency over intensity

The most important thing about learning a language is that you practice every day. That is why my XP goal is always 10 per day, even though I do almost 300 each day on average now. Having a low goal means you have no excuse for making time to practice every day. In reality, you will often want to do more after your goal, meaning there is no benefit to a high XP goal other than a higher chance you will lose your streak and motivation.

Clubs, friends and forums

Clubs and forums will help you with questions and hold you somewhat accountable, especially if you are competitive and find a group of like-minded language learners. Further, if you add your friends, they will all be able to see how much you have practiced each week and month. 

Outside resources

These are crucial to your longterm success in a language both during and especially after you finish your Duolingo course. In some cases, depending on your target language, you might be better off or forced to use a different app, which I will recommend here.

Translation

No matter what language you are learning, you need an offline dictionary app, period. Don't settle for a laggy online app or a phrasebook as your primary 'help me I don't understand' solution. This is especially important if you live somewhere or are visiting where your target language is spoken. Google Translate online is good for if you do not need perfection or for longer phrases and even sentences. You can also download a language for offline use and some languages allow picture translations (though this won't help you learn). There are some amazing browser extensions that let you read foreign text quite easily through automatic word or sentence translations. I have specific apps for certain languages in the apps list below.

The news

If you are learning a non-European language as a native English speaker, I don't want to get your hoped up. Just go to the next section. For all of you still around, this can be a great way to get timely, native exposure to a language. A beginner or intermediate learner will get much more out of the news than TV shows for reasons I will touch upon below. The potential problems include advanced or specific vocabulary and cultural references, neither of which you will see in places designed to teach.

Specific applications and browser extensions 

Checklist for any language:

• Anki
• Best SRS in the game
• Many study decks already in existence 
• Offline dictionary
• Rememberry
• Chrome extension 
• Automatic translations
• Option to save vocabulary into an SRS deck

Alternatives to Duolingo

• Beelingua
• Allows you to hear and read text karaoke style
• Free
• If you're intermediate, you can learn two language at once this way (I do Spanish and Japanese)
• Lingodeer
• Paid alternative to Duolingo. 
• Limited language selection
• Much better for Asian languages (I use this for Mandarin and for reviewing Japanese). 
• The activities and features are much better, but alas there is a paywall.
• Mango languages
• Has far more languages (around 70 compared to Duolingo's 37), including some very rare courses to learn as a second language like Bengali and Igbo. 
• This is also a paid app, and a pretty expensive on at that, but may be free for you if you are a member of some libraries
• Ling
• More languages that Duolingo doesn't have, such as Thai, but not offline and has a paywall after a few lessons

Language-specific

Japanese

• Rikaikun chrome extension
• Automatically provides reading and translation for Kanji
• Takoboto
• Offline dictionary #1
• Has a powerful Kanji compound search feature
• Japanese
• Bad name, good app 
• Offline dictionary #2
• Has a weak SRS
• Better for conjugations and short phrases
• Ability to access limited decks
• Kanji Study
• Invaluable. By far most powerful language resource
• Kanji broken down by JLPT level, grade and more
• Built-in dictionary
• Allows you to practice writing characters
• JLPT
• Pretty self-explanatory if you know what this test is

Mandarin

• Lingodeer
• See above
• Pleco
• Offline dictionary
• HSK #
• Characters, tone practice etc. by HSK level (I have HSK 2)
• Lingodeer supplementary material by HSK level

Final thoughts

Learning a language is one of if not the single most beneficial hobby you can start this new year if you have not already. Being bilingual has extraordinary benefits in terms of cognitive function, disease prevention, memory, employment opportunities, and most of all culture. Though I hope this posts helps, ultimately learning a language is something that's completely up to you. If you need someone to annoy you and keep you on the right path, let me know and I will definitely do so!

Good luck!

¡Buena suerte!

頑張って下さい！

Veel succes!

Bonne chance!

祝好运！

Bahati njema!

सौभाग्य!

(Google-sensei helped me with those last three)

Come on baby, America!

Month two has come to a close and I certainly have a lot of interesting experiences and cultural discoveries to talk about! Instead of doing that, though, I thought I would share a bizarre story about America's reach overseas and influence and... OK it's a story about how funny the elementary schoolers are.

So there's this song... I highly recommend checking this out with English subtitles. It's hilarious:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr--GVIoluU

The song responsible, 91 million views and all

I came to Japan expecting to be preceded by countless expectations, stereotypes, and terrible news cycles about my *official* home country, America (the use of the word official here is a whole story in itself, but for later). To an extent this has been true, but dramatically less so than in New Zealand, where my classmates would ask why I wasn't fat and if I could locate the United States on a map without missing a beat. In my experience so far, the Japanese tend to be much more apathetic about world politics and the nuances of America's behaviors. Nowhere is this more true than in elementary school. 

Now to set the stage, I have to give a short 自己紹介 (jikoshoukai/self-introduction) to every class where I explain my background and answer some questions. One of my favorite parts of getting to know new classes is having them guess things about my identity. Why?

モーガン先生、何歳ですか？何歳と思いますか？ええ…65歳？

Morgan-sensei, how old are you? How old do you think I am? Hmm... 65?

And so on. I've had students guess I was from Africa, ask if I was married to their homeroom teacher, think I spoke only German, ask what my job was... seriously, what do you think I'm doing right now? Even funnier is what they extrapolate from the information I give.

ああ、22歳！お母さんは24歳！子供が何人がいる？

Oh, 22! My mom is 24! How many children do you have? 

I guess there really isn't much to do in this town... Anyway, the thing that confused me most was that the first thing every first, second, and third-grade class did when I said "America" was burst out into a co-ordinated chant and throw their thumbs behind their heads. Without fail. They would also periodically remember I said America later in the class and get started all over again. This is made even more funny by the "U-S-A" chant at the beginning of the song which invariably comes up when teaching the alphabet. It's inescapable. What's more, this funny song has completely replaced any other information these kids have about the United States. 

In most countries I've been to, kids have at least a vague idea about what kind of things happen in America and what things in their country are from America. In Japan, however, me claiming hot dogs, burgers, and pizza are popular in America was met with disbelief and laughter. No American celebrity names could ring a bell. Even using my best Japanese to ask questions doesn't extract any information out of the younger students.

Is there a deeper meaning to all of this? Probably not–they thought I was 65, after all.

Japan

After nearly a month in Japan, I've finally got the chance to write down and share some of the thoughts from my first month here. This not even close to all of the incredible and interesting experiences I've had so far, but I hope to share those in separate posts in the coming weeks. Here's the highlights of my first 29 days in a form similar to a Q&A!

Why Japan?

Fully explaining this requires its own post, but the short version is as follows: on a whim, I decided to enroll in Japanese 101 the day before my first day of university. Even though it was at times my most challenging class, I stuck to it and found a way to use my Japanese while staying on track with my ultimate goal of pursuing an MPP in International Relations. Now, I'm with the Japanese Exchange Teaching (JET) program teaching English in three elementary schools in Niigata prefecture. I arrived to Tokyo August 5th and to Niigata prefecture on the 9th (after orientation). My first day at school was this past Monday, August 27th!

What are you doing?

On a daily basis, I get up, tuck my futon away into the closet of my tatami apartment, drive my tiny EK-Wagon named 「フロゾン」 to school on the left side of the road, and co-teach English classes. For the first couple weeks this is mainly me explaining my background, sharing a few things about North Carolina, and playing some folk music on my guitar. Although I've played and performed for 10 years now, I think this is the most I have ever played for an audience. In case you're curious, this is the song I've played dozens of times now, but since they can't understand the lyrics I've made it a bit more cheerful.

The name of my city, Gosen, in Japanese

I've quickly learned the 35/hrs a week in my contract is actually a very funny joke and thus have not had much free time outside of work, errands, cooking and exercise. I hope to flush out this section a bit more once I get more into the swing of things.

Wait... car? Apartment? What's your living situation?

Since I have a new position and thus have no predecessor as is typical for JET participants, I arrived to an empty tatami-style apartment in the oldest building in town. It quite literally did not have anything in it (not even toilet paper!) from the previous inhabitant, so I have been busy buying pans and towels and all sorts of things you never realized you need starting from scratch. Additionally, the building itself has very little insulation, meaning temperatures in the 90s (mid- to high-30s in celsius) in my apartment (and freezing temperatures to come in Winter). After almost three full weeks of nearly endless trips to the ¥100 store, I have a pretty comfortable arrangement, including two fans and and AC unit pointed at me at all times.

The car is as typically Japanese as they come. Left-hand drive, box-like, motorcycle-sized engine and quite literally the smallest possible car where I can fit my knees under the steering wheel. I am sure it is just as funny watching me climb in and out of the car as you are imagining. Unfortunately, the car is essential to my work and my days of high-horsedly walking everywhere are finished. 

Fresh, pre-made meals like this will usually run you about $4 US or less

Accurate depiction of me driving

How's Japan?

It's amazing. I will go into more depth about expectations versus reality very soon, but for now I can say it is everything it is said to be. Here's a quick bullet journaling:

• The sushi is delicious and far cheaper
• Doorways are lower and I hit my head a lot
• Anime, manga and karaoke are as wildly popular as they seem
• 7eleven is a gift from the Gods
• Cash is used almost exclusively
• People do flash their blinkers as a thank-you for merging while driving
• Chopsticks are dominant and napkins are nonexistant
• Sitting on the floor and no shoes at restaurants is very common
• Respect and kindness are unparalleled
• I have to go to the plus-sized store for pants and shoes
• Fruits are a delicacy 

Now I don't live in Tokyo, so urban Japan is not something I see often. Rural Japan, referred to as the 'inaka' 「田舎」has its own completely different societal structure in countless ways. Again, this is something I plan on flushing out soon!

How's school?

Ahh, back to grade school. I have been lucky enough to receive an exceptionally hospitable welcome at every school so far. From 'oohs' and 'aahs' at my fumbling Japanese self-introductions to a school of 500 singing me happy birthday, it has been heartwarming and exciting. The school style is also completely different in a way I really enjoy. Some differences I've noted include:

• Again, shoes off (bring some indoor shoes instead)
• Very open rooms and bright hallways
• Eating lunch with the students in their room (self-served and cleaned)
• Students come to the staff room to get teachers (happens to me more as an assistant teacher)
• A lot of fun and games
• Classes usually stay together for years, so the atmosphere changes wildly by class
• Tons of calming music and announcements made over the speakers
• Greeting at the start and end of class
• Teeth brushing after lunch

Out of respect for my students and co-workers, I will almost certainly not have many pictures from my time here, but I hope to share these experiences in other ways.

Similarities to the Netherlands: canals, clean water, known for Tulips, flat

Fireworks on my second weekend

What have you learned so far?

Luckily, I religiously tracked my study habits and results over the summer, so I can give a bit of quantitative data here. On average, I have been learning about a month's worth of Japanese every week here based upon my results before coming to Japan. One of my favorite things to study are the various Japanese characters. Around the time I graduated from UNC, I knew approximately 850 of them. Now, I know almost 1500. Here are some charts with nice colors and a satisfying upward trend.

Total characters recognized at all confidence levels (few weeks old)

Learning rate over time

My speaking and listening comprehension have skyrocketed, albeit to a fairly intermediate level. I have good confidence navigating any common situation in Japan now, though more complicated interactions are still a struggle (I'll explain your order at a restaurant but couldn't get you out of a ticket). With every milestone my decision to move here seems more correct and my heart more full.

The more of the language I learn, the more of the culture I gain access to. Although I am far from understanding the nuance of most situations, the things I have learned so far have been extremely interesting and have changed my frame of mind in a number of situations. In my best impersonation of a broken record, I hope to expand on this in the coming weeks. Sayonara! 

Think a $7.25 minimum wage is low? It's actually lower than that

You might think that $7.25 is the minimum compensation one could get for an hour's worth of work in the USA, as the name implies. Unfortunately, there are a variety of loopholes and power plays that allow employers to pay their employees much less than this--legally. I am not talking about situations where wage is below $7.25 but take-home pay is higher. In America, there are fully legal strategies to pay lower than minimum wage.

There are other important discussions to be had about the minimum wage, too. Cycles of poverty. Predatory business practices. Corruption and intimidation. Cost of living adjustments. This post is not about that. The purpose of this post is to make sure everyone is on the same page that the minimum wage is not $7.25 an hour. 

First: how rich do they get? (Skip if you're already mad)

I first thought about this post when I read an article about the new richest people in the world. At a time when global inequality is at the highest it has ever been, I began to think about how to justify this massive wealth when people regularly earn minimum wage (or less). Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and sometimes the world's wealthiest person, is worth $123.9 billion at the time of writing. Let's do a quick thought experiment to contextualize this:

Imagine the average American would pick up a dollar or quarter off the ground, but not a dime or penny because they aren't worth the trouble. For Jeff Bezos, this would be mean $660,000 is too much of a hassle. This could be a nice house in queens with a FREE sign and the keys in the door or a couple of luxury cars. (Neil deGrasse Tyson originally used a similar thought experiment with himself and Bill Gates)

Now, we all think people who have more difficult or more important jobs deserve better compensation. Likewise, the people that took a risk and paved their own way should reap their spoils. But how can you justify one man's time as being worth 2,760,000 times that of the average person? He made $9,278,846.15 every hour in 2017 if you assume 40-hour weeks and no vacations, which is incorrect. Very few people will ever interact with that amount in their lifetime, let alone in an hour.

Minimum Wage vs. Real Wage (from the Economic Policy Institute)

In the last paragraph, I compared Jeff Bezos to the average person in America. The situation is even more dismal for half of our country. His average hourly wage would be more than 1,200,000 times higher than the lowest wage you could possibly earn in America if minimum wage were actually our minimum. In reality, there are millions of Americans far below this amount. In a quick Facebook status, I discovered many of my friends and relatives have experienced this at some point in their lives. There are huge moral, social, and economic implications to this horrific practice, but I am saving that for another time. Here, I just want to give a brief introduction to how and why the minimum wage is way lower than we say it is.

Disabilities

To me, this was the most shocking loophole in the minimum wage I encountered. Although the opposite seems more just, it turns out it is legal to pay those with disabilities less than the fully-abled in the United States. This is because of a 1930s-era modification to the Fair Labor Standards Act, which allows employers to apply to the Department of Labor if they have employees with disabilities and, after approval, pay them less than $1 per hour. Though this only affects 3% of those with disabilities in the workforce, that amounts to almost 200,000 people being paid below the minimum wage. Again, this isn't even beginning to account for the huge disparities in employment rate or how they're treated, it's just the wages for the work they do.

Loopholes by the hour

It is painfully common to overhear restaurant goers complain about giving "extra money" to unskilled waitresses and waiters who already don't deserve the "minimum wage." Lack of appreciation for the service industry aside, this statement is also flat-out wrong. First, tipping in the USA is not "extra money" or a courtesy on behalf of the magnanimous and ineffable customer because servers do not make the minimum wage everywhere. In my state, North Carolina, I worked as a waiter for $2.13 an hour plus tips, the lowest federally possible. But wait, that's not all! In addition to the 18 states that pay $2.13 per hour, some states differentiate between different services and pay as low as $1.75 an hour. That isn't even covering the deductions I'll talk about later.

"Well," you say, "that's not working for below minimum wage because the employer has to pay the difference if your tips don't make $7.25 or more!"

You are correct about the employer paying the difference, but this does not actually mean people do not work for below minimum wage. To show this, I'll share a personal story.

One day, after working 5 hard hours on my feet and having up to 8 tables at a time, I came away with about $40 in tips, making my total earnings around $50 for 5 hours. Not bad! After closing, though, my boss made me clean the floors, bathrooms, and prepare for tomorrow, all while still clocking in at $2.13 an hour. This work had zero chance at being tipped. I came away from 7 hours of pretty difficult labor with $54, or down to $7.70 per hour down from $10. My two hours of cleaning earned me some back pain and $4.26.

Tips don't just subsidize the wages of those who provide service to the customer either. My mother, who has been kind enough to contribute to this post, recalls being required to give some of her tips to the busboys at a restaurant where she worked. If this doesn't seem right to you, you're not alone; tip pooling is now illegal in some states, but this has not stopped the practice. President Trump is also trying to bring it back and extend the practice to cooks, who currently earn much more than others in restaurants.

Working on commission or as a contractor

Imagine, for some reason, there were a profession where you could be paid based upon how far you can run--a dollar per mile. For me, this would mean earning $6-7 or maybe $8 per hour on a good day. In most cases, this means being paid below minimum wage. This wouldn't be illegal, though, because the possibility of earning more exists and is at least partially based upon one's skill. An employer could say: "Well the men's world record would earn you $13.23 an hour and the women's would get you $11.51. It's not my fault you can't run fast enough!"

Such is the case for many who work as contractors or by commission. Being paid based on one's skill is perceived as one of the most important factors in wage determination in America. This does not mean the loopholes that arise are defensible; a minimum wage is just that and cannot be lowered for any reason. Further, sometimes the determinants of one's pay are not even in the control of the employee. A friend of mine taught classes at a rate of $1 per hour per student. Having below 8 students was legal because the type of work was technically contracting.

Minimum Wage Globally (from CNN money)

One might counter-argue: "What about the self-employed? If you can't sell enough in the real world, you won't make minimum wage either!"

The problem with this argument is the application of the fruits of labor. An employee working on commission or as a contractor has entered into an agreement with someone who will in some way benefit from their work. This can be hard to measure in many cases, but the responsibility to make sure the exchange is profitable is ultimately on the party asking for the work to be done. If the exchange was a bad idea, the fault should be on the one who came up with it. A self-employed person keeps everything they earn and are responsible for themselves.

Further, one could encourage contractors not to take unprofitable contracts or for commissioners to work for successful companies, but this is not always possible. For artists who need to build a portfolio or those in situations where something is better than nothing, sub-minimum wage contracts are a familiar experience.

This is how I worked 13 hours for $65 at a zip line, or exactly $5 an hour.

Internships and volunteer work

Any young person today is familiar with the rat race that is entering the workforce. Entry-level positions somehow require 3 years of experience. How is this possible? They respond, "internships and volunteer work."

According to some measures, almost half of all internships are unpaid and, by definition, all volunteer activity is unpaid. Further, many volunteer and internship opportunities cost money in the forms of subsistence during the experience, travel costs, or a fee in other cases; a friend of mine helping with this story paid $700 to volunteer for 'experience' in their field.

How is this legal you ask? Well, a surprising amount of the time it is not. According to a 2013 article by the Washington Post, an internship must satisfy the following criteria to be legally unpaid:

"1) The internship, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to training which would be given in an educational environment;
 2) The internship experience is for the benefit of the intern;
 3) The intern does not displace regular employees, but works under close supervision of existing staff;
 4) The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the intern; and on occasion its operations may actually be impeded;
 5) The intern is not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of the internship; and
 6) The employer and the intern understand that the intern is not entitled to wages for the time spent in the internship."

If your internship does not meet these criteria, tough luck. My friends' personal experience confirm that even 5 years after this ruling unpaid internships often amount to busy work or slightly better. Some have even had positions identical to those of paid employees, including hours and responsibilities but not including age. Whether due to exploitation or design, the internship and volunteer system is work below minimum wage.

Work that provides housing or food deductions

As touched upon in other sections, any employer that provides housing or food can legally reduce their employee's wages to below the state or federal minimum. If the employee gives consent, this also includes union dues, charitable contributions, or insurance premiums. Deductions for required uniforms, cash shortages or lost sales are legal too, but not if it reduces the wage below the minimum.

In some cases, the deductions can leave very little leftover. Essentially, this means places like summer camps can have nearly free labor for allowing employees to stay in a building that was already built and giving them food they have no choice but to eat.

US Federal Prison Population Over Time

Work done in incarceration

This section should be the most self-explanatory as there is an abundance of information on abuse of prison labor and the prison-industrial complex. Things get even scarier when the school-to-prison pipeline and unequal policing and sentencing are considered. Here are some quick facts:

• The average prisoner makes between $0.14 and $0.63 per hour, but can make as little as, well, nothing
• The minimum daily wage is not only below $4, but has actually decreased over time
• The above wages are subject to deductions, which can leave a day's work compensated at $0.50
• Prison labor often drives local companies and service providers out of business
• Things like phone calls can cost money in prison (sometimes $10 or more)
• Refusing to do labor can result in punishment

Incarceration Rates Globally

These conditions affect over 2.3 million people in the USA. Of course, those who commit crimes do so knowing they are risking their freedom. However, there is no way of arguing that forcing people to do labor that is either close to or literally unpaid is not a form of slavery. There is a long list of human rights violations associated with prisons in the United States.

Informal work

Although this will come as no surprise to many, it is true that undocumented or informal workers are paid far below minimum wage. The legality of this situation is murky, but this is know to subject people to horrific working conditions and extremely low pay. It cannot be argued that this work be done in formal sectors either; most work done by undocumented or informal labor is simply impossible to hire through legal means. In fact, recent immigration crackdowns have lead to food shortages.

Even for those with documents, informal work can become a trap. Suppose you were offered $1,000 to clean out a storage unit or mow lawns over the summer. If you are able to do this work quickly, you could make a great wage! But if there were hidden complications or other restrictions, you have little recourse to get back those wasted hours working below minimum wage.

Unpaid overtime

By law, overtime is supposed to be compensated at 1.5x the normal hourly wage, but again there are loopholes. In this section, I'll share two personal stories from friends of mine who decided to help out with this post. A complete list of the exemptions can be found here.

First, as an under-18, there are limits to the amount of hours you can legally work. These can depend on the profession and state, but generally you're looking at about half the time. This concept is sometimes lost on employers, though, who hire children based on the work to be done and not the hourly wage. One friend of mine was hired at a mechanic's shop and was told to clock out before continuing on work that was unfinished when reaching a daily legal limit of hours. Bullying is commonplace for children working, but it is not limited to those situations.

Another loophole is seasonal employment. A friend of mine worked a summer job for a salary in a state where the minimum wage was $11.00 per hour. Although the stated terms were 40 per week at a rate of $16.47 per hour, staffing shortages eventually drove the required hours higher without changing the pay. Later in the season, hour increases soared to almost double and drove the pay rate to $8.57. On the worst days, the pay equated to $7.29 per hour, effectively eliminating the state's sovereignty by countering its minimum wage increase. If the same situation happened to a seasonal employee in another state, this loophole could drive pay down to $3.21 per hour without accounting for any of the loopholes I mentioned earlier.

Conclusion

Make of this information what you wish. I personally have some very strong feelings about income inequality and its relationship with democracy and sociopolitical stability, but this is not that post. My main intention with this piece was to focus attention on how backwards our minimum wage really is and to share some stories of myself and my friends. Once we all understand the facts about minimum wage, we can better work together to see it improved.