I'm 17 years old, and I have never worked a day in my life until now...?

Question

I always told people that I had my entire life ahead of me to work, and I never wanted to degrade myself by working at a fast food joint grilling burgers, or putting people's food in bags at a grocery store. I wanted to enjoy my teen years, and not spend everyday after school working or spend my summers working. (I am also a three-season athlete so it was not out of laziness.)
Well, I ended up getting an internship with my town newspaper this year, and after successfully writing numerous articles in the sports section, they hired me. I will be getting paid $30-$40 an article. Isn't it great that my first job as a teenager is not degrading in any way? What do you think?

Wow...I am sorry. I did not mean to insult anyone when I said "degrading." I actutally should not have said that, and I am sorry if I insulted anyone. I do appreciate people that work at those jobs! Believe me, I don't think I am better than anyone nor am I a snob! It came out all wrong.

I hope everyone that answered this question will see this! I feel really awful for wording that question. I sound braggish, pompus, conceded at so many levels! That was not my intention at all. Believe me, I would work at a fast food place or a supermaket and wouldn't think of myself any less, but I just wanted to see what people thought about me never having to do that. (I admit, I bragged way too much. It is unlike me.) I aplogize to everyone I offended. You had the right to think of me as being extremly snobbish. I really am sorry.

Answer 1

It is great that you found a job that you like but don't put others down for working at mcdonalds or the grocery store. There is nothing wrong with those jobs and after all it is a job -people have to do what they have to do, so be thankful you do have a job.

Answer 2

You sound like what you are, a whiny, spoiled, conceited snot of a kid. You were just very lucky to get that internship, and you were even more lucky to have parents who were willing to put up with your lousy, snobbish, smart alecky attitude. When I was your age, if I had behaved the way you do, I would not have been able to sit down for a week because my butt would have been so sore from being spanked. You may be a three season athlete, but you have a LOT to learn about the real world and how it operates, including the fact that it doesn't owe ANYONE, including YOU, a living. Kids like you annoy me because some of us had to work really hard as teens- I got my first job when I was just 16, and I had to spend long hours working outside in the fields on the farm. I made the minimum wage, which at that time was only $3.35 an hour, and I had to put up with a lot of flack from the people I worked with. I'm not complaining about it because it made me a stronger, better, more accepting person than I was, but that didn't mean it was easy. Few things in life are.

Most teenagers I know usually have to do what I did, especially if they plan on college or higher education after they leave high school. The great majority of them do not have parents who were independently wealthy and able to subsidize their activities the way you did, and you are being rude to talk down to them the way you have in this question. No one likes a bragger, Scott, and people like kids who are snotty and smart alecky even less. I think you owe the other teens on here an apology, and you need to change your attitude. You were just lucky, you didn't get where you are by any special talent. Think about it.

Answer 3

I loved how you use the term "degrading" to describe a job.

Let's see how degrading it is for you when you ate a burger that fell onto the floor or when your eggs got bagged underneath your cans of soup.

Yes, it is very lucky that you had a great job working in your town's newspaper. However, some of us did not grow up with the same opportunities you did. Some of us have to spend every day after school and our entire summer working just to survive. So what if we are work for the supermarket or a fast food restaurant? It does not mean that you are better than us in any way. In fact, I feel sorry for you and your lack of experience in the real world.

Answer 4

Hey! honest labor is not degrading, hard maybe. Good for you on your first job. In our state minimum wage is close to nine dollars a hr...durning school, teens can work minimum of 22 hrs. If they maintain there grades, they can work up to 32 hrs. That's an average of $300 a week. So you would have to write ten stories a week and, "get them published." probably have to attend various sporting events and pray that you don't get writer's block and hope you can keep up the pace to make as much as those those other young people, whose jobs you find degrading. Pray you are not found out for being a snob...or you may have to take a "degrading" job and probably get fired because of not being customer oriented.










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Answer 5

I don't think ANY job is degrading - the important thing is to work hard and do the best job you can at whatever it is you do. Someone has to work at the fast-food restaurants and bag groceries (not to mention clean public toilets and take tolls). To imply that those are degrading jobs make you sound pretty stuck up. Maybe you should have taken one of those jobs - it would have taught you a valuable lesson in humility. That being said, congratulations on your new job. I hope everything works out for you -

Edited to add: It's nice that you apologized, and it's too bad you came off in such a bad way since you seem like a nice guy. Again, congrats on the new job and good luck!

Answer 6

You sound a bit like I was many decades ago. I didn't have my first full-time job till I had graduated from highschool, and then only because I suddenly realized I'd be paying my own way to college. I worked hard that summer following my highschool graduation, and earned enough to enroll in college the following September, and worked my way entirely through all the college I got. I hope you, as I did, realize soon how much you've missed by not working sooner, and then pursue "the Protestant work ethic" as it's called, and soon realize the value, not just in money, of a hard day's work. I'm glad for you that you had those years in athletics, and that must have been fun, and I wish I had pursued that in highschool, but, I didn't. I was enjoying my teen years in less constructive ways, but once I got to working, I seemed to make the most of it. I didn't become rich, not monetarily so, but I did become rich in spending time with the working people. I worked hard to become one of them. Maybe I never did, but I tried. Now I'm retired. I started out slow, in very dirty work, to get into college, and it paid off for me. Work hard. Never be afraid to work. Some of the best people in the world sweat like dogs before they go home at night, and they're the smartest, most wise people I've ever known. God Bless you.

Answer 7

I felt the same way I didnt want my first job to be at a fast food place either, or at a grocery store but I got my first job at the age of 19 at a clothing store which is pretty cool. I think its great that you got a job at the newspaper. You should be excited hun

Answer 8

Wow, I don't have a "degrading job" and I'm only 15. I work at a call center and work in an office environment. I get paid about 175 for just working Saturday and Sunday. Not too bad, but I don't brag about it.

Answer 9

Well, I'm happy that you got the internship, that will be great experience for you. But working at a fast food joint or a grocery store are also great jobs for teenagers too. My son's first job last summer was working at an amusement park making corndogs!! Be grateful for any job you have!

Answer 10

Working fast food or bagging grocerys is not degrading my husband did that all through high school and did side heating and air jobs with his dad then took one class in college and got a job doing heating and air and then switched jobs because of location now at twenty years old making 13.00$ an hour and he has barely been at that job for 2 years. He does heating and air conditioning. He is in a lead man position. Now lets pretend that you and him are competeing for that 13.00$ an hour job. Ok lets look at you first.
Never had a job, athlete(which shows that you are physically fit), (lets even pretend that you went to college to do this job for three years. Which shows you want to learn)
Now lets look at my husband,
Worked all through high school at the same fast food place (shows that he can handle a job and hold it) Did side work (gives him experence) Only took one class in college for the job (could maybe have taken more that could have been benificial) Has preveiously had a heating and air job but is now looking for new emplyment for location reasons.

Now I KNOW for a fact they would not higher you because he was applying with someone in the same situation similar to you, you have never had a job. They dont know if you can handle it. Plus it gave him 5 years of experince that YOU didnt get. Though he did not go to the college part but in the end it does not matter heating and air still takes a certain amount of on the job experience to give you the licence to open your own business. Because of this on the job experience he has learned what he needs to know to pass the tests with out schooling.
In the long run your better off getting that job that you think is degrading now seeing how stuck up you have been
WHO IS MORE DEGRADING?