Your example is very extreme. Having an after school part time job as you’re growing up will prepare you for quite a bit, and set us apart from our peers that didn’t work, and instead wasted their days after school or on the weekends. I take it you never worked growing up ? It’s building essential life skills, not inhaling noxious fumes working 16 hr days in mines, this isn’t the 1800’s. I loved flipping burgers and making a paycheck at 15
I wasn’t sure where I stood on this and read a lot of comments.
One thing that seems common is that many of those who worked young seem to think it made them better than the other kids somehow. They “wasted” their summer, while you built “essential life skills” unlike the person you’re replying to, who did not? Are you still “set apart” from the person you replied to?
I might think getting thrown into the system at a younger age is the real waste of life. I’ve had a job since I was 15, but I really don’t think it made me better than anyone.
It didn’t make me “better” but from talking to people I went to college with (that didn’t get jobs early), I’d definitely say I was more prepared for the workforce.
Also having money was dope and my fast food job was fun. I still enjoyed my life and summer outside of work, even more so because I could afford to do and get shit that my parents might not have been able to give me. It’s not an all or nothing deal it’s just a different life experience. I think it would be infantilizing to take the choice away from teenagers, though it is important to regulate it as shitty people will take advantage of it.