12 or 13. Paper boy. What else? Then at 17 as a painter at the local state mental hospital. A friend from high school and I painted all the metal work on the slate roof of a huge 3 story building and some of the water tower. It’s a wonder we didn’t kill ourselves. Then at 18 janitor, ticket taker, furnace stoker, air conditioning operator for a local movie theater at which I later became the projectionist at 19.
I got a paper route when I was 12. Before then I sold xmas cards and made enough money to buy a telescope, but I’m not sure if that counts as a job. I got my first paycheck at 16 when I started working in my uncle’s restaurant.
I was 12. The job was walking racing greyhounds and I got paid the fabulous sum of $6 a day! The work was dangerous because the 4 dogs I walked were skittish and would bolt if they saw something they wanted to chase, dragging me behind them and grievously tearing up my flesh! By the time I was 14 I was getting $10 a day and by the time I was 16 I’d saved up enough money to go into business for myself. Since then, withthe exception of a year working in banking, I have been my own boss
mm
So did they catch you tagging, or did you get away with it?
When I was 11, I got my baby sitting certification and made $5-$8 per hour.
At 16 I started working as a cashier for Shaw’s Supermarket. In the 5 months I was there, I went from making $5.25 per hour to $6.75 per hour.
Babysitting, age 11 or so through my freshman year of college. First real job with paychecks and deductions and such, age 15, scooping ice cream at Swensen’s, thus making me a third-generation ice cream professional.
Started babysitting on my own for pay at around 12. Had a flyer route with my brother at about 14 and at 16 I started working in a concession stand for a ‘real’ paycheck.
Age 15, at a community center working with 5yr olds. $60 a week, which worked out to a little less than $2hr. (this was only 3 yrs ago, taking advantage of us little kids)
First real, pay per hour job was at Coldstone’s, where after 6 months and doing the work of two people in half as many hours, I was still the lowest paid employee. We all got the same base wage, but as a cake decorator I didnt get any tips. So it worked out to me being paid the least, even though I was doing by far the most work. (short of the manager, I had moved “up” from an ice cream scooper to cake decorating manager)
I hope my new job doesn’t screw me out of pay like my first two did.
13 - worked on a farm
18 - worked in a factory (first job with an actual paycheck)
20 - started working the job I still have 23 years later
First job I can recall is picking strawberries, I was 9 or 10. When I was 12 I caddied at a private golf course. The older boys got first pick, but I think I got one or two carries a day. I’m kind of foggy on the pay, but I think it was 5-6 dollars for 9 holes and 10-12 for 18 plus a buck or two in tips, sometimes more. That was big money in 1951.
In H.S. I had several jobs: car hop (yeah guys did that too), stock boy at a Loblaw’s Supermarket (Ohio), order filler at a large wholesale hardware supply, some others I can’t remember.
Umm… 21.
It was a 6-month paid internship, and it was this year.
Before that… never worked a day in my life. My folks never made me work and I guess I’m lazy. Pretty sad, eh?
I got conned into doing work experience (no pay!) by the myth that a university degree would have been useless unless I had some sort of work experience to go with it.
At 15 or 16 I started working behind the counter at a local drugstore. My next job was in college working in cataloging and acquisitions at an anthropology library.
I had a paper route when I was 9. I learned that it was too much for me to handle (I had like 250 papers to deliver and I was a very tiny little kid) and told my boss I was going to give it up. HE TOLD ME I WAS NOT ALLOWED TO QUIT. AND I BELIEVED HIM!! When I finally mentioned that to my parents, they told me indeed I was not bound into indentured servitude and they assisted me in quitting my job.
I started babysitting at age 12 and never went without working a weekend doing that until I was 20 or so.
Was hired at a local computer store at age 14 to empty the wastebaskets and dust. Worked there for four years, and was office manager by the time I had to quit to go away to college. Yup, I’m a nerd from birth 
We got away with it. In fact we were paid 35 cents an hour for it.
Real job - not babysitting, mowing lawns, etc. - at 15. Worked at a Foster Freeze, which is Dairy Queen’s bastard son. LONG time ago. I made $1.50/hr. but they automatically took out 15 cents an hour to compensate for what we ate. WTF? No wonder we were filling up quart containers with ice cream and hot fudge to take home at the end of the shift. Of course, we all got caught and were fired. Ah, good times.
My next job was exceptionally cool - my counselor got me work experience, which meant less time at school, plus the job was great - I worked at the school district printing office, got to run the printing press and collate and bind materials to be used in schools. Worked with a very cool hippie lady (ha, she was probably 25 at the most) who took me to lunch a lot and then we would go get stoned. Yay, stoned people working a printing press! To this day, I am amazed that I have all my fingers attached.
- After school and weekends as cook at the DQ next to my school. Walked to work and hitched home afterward.
Minimum wage was 4.25, I think, and after a couple of months I bought with my earnings a 14-year-old Ford Pinto that got me to and from until I graduated. I couldn’t have been more proud of myself.
16, in the summer, lifeguard.