When I was a teenager, my folks didn't want me working. They thought that my attention should be spent on homework and they did a really good job of always providing me with whatever I needed from a material perspective.
But when I was 16, I finally got a job working for the local Burger King. My parents were NOT happy with me - they even refused to TAKE me to work - even when the weather was incredibly bad... and I remember one particularly nasty day of walking through the snow, slush and blowing wind just to get to work.
Of course, the job was not exactly easy - food service isn't a cakewalk (don't let anyone tell you any different). I didn't like touching raw food (still don't), especially condiments that I would NEVER even eat. And the pay is even worse.
Federal Minimum Wage when I first got a job had just been raised to $3.15. I remember this clearly from the big poster that was required to be placed in the BK breakroom. Even if I worked EVERY available hour between when I got out of school at 3pm, until I went to bed around 11pm (8 hours), I would still only be able to make $25.20/day.
Flash forward to now. I make well more per hour than I did per day back then. This is a good thing (and would be even better if inflation didn't exist). But now that I'm no longer an hourly employee, I have to work until the job is done. I don't get to stop when the clock strikes 5pm every day. And on most days, I have several hours of work to do each evening.
And it appears that these days, it's even longer. With one negotiation, I've been working until 7-8pm every night for months. Which dilutes my "per hour" equivalent rate.
So these are the days where I long to be an hourly employee again.... and let's not even start the conversation if I feel like all my time is well spent. ;)
