When you first started working, what was your wage?

15 $4.05/hr

The earliest job I had was delivering newspapers, and I think I was paid 10 cents per paper.
It took me about an hour to deliver them, so my wage was about $1/hour.

That was in 1957, when I was 10.

Security guard at $4.00 an hour, a bit above minimum wage.

Officially/legally. I started on my 16th birthday. $4/hr, washing dishes at a BBQ joint. There is no God…..

First job with W-2 and Social Security Number – - I was 17 and got paid $1.25/hour working part time, minimum wage for full time was $1.25/hour. Pumped gas but illegally drove the tow truck, did lube jobs and changed tires. Needed to be 18 (I was passing for 21 since I was 14) to do dangerous jobs. Great summer job ! !

In 1967 (age 16) I earned $1 per hour working as a pan washer at a cafeteria. I spent the money on cheap shirts at Kmart.

@Tropical_Willie Late 1960’s way back in the day! Woodstock and the moon landing (allegedly, lol)

$1.80 per hour.

$76/week for a 37.5-hour week at a major U.S. company’s home office in downtown Boston. Big deal when they raised me to $80.

Oh, wait, that was wrong. First steady summer job, babysitting a ten-year-old and doing housework, 20 hours a week for $20.

Kinda hard to say. First job was working for my friend’s father. He was a mechanical engineer and was teaching me drafting. He paid cash and I didn’t punch a timeclock. The first actually paid (on the books) job I had was paying something like $2.30/hr

My first unofficial job was bundling flowers at my family’s shop. I was 12. They paid me in cookies.

My first real job was at a tobacco shop. I was 15. They paid me $2.85/hr, which was minimum wage.

My first job was as a paperboy. I don’t even recall. Maybe $4 a day
First hourly job was about $2.50

First job where I was paid by the hour, in 1972: Valet car parker, $3 per hour cash. Minimum wage at the time was $1.65.

I did a little babysitting when I was a teen and I forgot what I got paid. I remember one job where the couple came home around 1 in the morning and they gave me $20 and I was so happy. That was a good pay.

My first official job was 3.50 per hour in a store that was like a smaller version of Walmart, what used to be called a five and ten store, because the original was Woolworth’s which had items for five and ten cents. My wage was a touch above minimum wage at the time.

I was on draw vs commission. I’m pretty sure draw was $3.35 an hour. I wound up making slightly more than that.

When I graduated college and landed my first real job I told my Father what I was making.
It was around the same annual salary that he was making after working 30 years.

Don’t recall. Shortly before I went off to the Spanish American War.

My first job was an analyst for an investment bank straight out of university. I hated it and quit after about 3 -4 years (possibly less now I think about it) and somehow became a nurse while I was looking for something else. I now have words like consultant and senior and such like in my job description and, for a nurse, my salary is probably about as good as it gets. But I’m still earning considerably less than I was 25 years ago when I was 21/22.

Mind you at the end of the day I feel like I have achieved more than just moving the decimal point about.

@Lightlyseared ”somehow became a nurse” Don’t you need to go to college to become a nurse?

^^^ Go in thinking you are becoming an accountant and come out as a nurse. Yeah, that happens all the time!

Just over $5 an hour. My first job was as a bag boy in a grocery store. I earned min wage which was….maybe $5.25. But I got wage increases quickly thereafter and thought I was raking it in when I got to like 7 and 8.

I am very old.

@Entropy You can’t be very old if the minimum wage was $5.25. Unless you weren’t in the US maybe.

When I was 12 years old I made $400 a month for having two paper routes.

Later I made $400 a month plus tips like $20 per client, for delivering newspapers right when they arrived at my door.

I went to bed just after my deliveries where finished. I made enough money to be able to order a cheeseburger pizza every night. Also a six pack of Coke.

@Dig_Dug Yes. I quit job 1. Got bored (its and ADHD thing) while job hunting and started working part time as a porter / orderly in NHS hospital in London. Ended up in a department that liked me. They sponsored me to train as a nurse full time while still. paying me.

I got $1.25 per hour when i started. That was quickly raised to $1.60 after about one month. I worked 20 hours per week as a summer job and took home a whopping $32.
In today’s money that is $289.00 or $14.50/hour.
I was a counter person and chef at a fast food chicken place.

I started working at the Cinema when I was 15. I made $1/hour. Everyone working there was in the teens and we had a blast!

Janitor: $3.25 an hour for a 4 hour shift = $13 a day.