Jobs Give Teen-Agers Grip on Reality of Dollar : And Suddenly, It’s Not Play Money Anymore
About 30 help-wanted listings were posted in a hallway at John F. Kennedy High School in Granada Hills one recent afternoon for jobs such as counter work at fast-food restaurants, baby-sitting and pumping gas.
Inside the office, Manuel Fernandez, work-experience coordinator at the school, took a long file tray from the top of his desk and rifled through the many slips. Each represented a student matched with a job, 337 in all.
“Most kids don’t value money the way their parents do,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean kids today have it easy. They’ll buy a car, but in many instances the car owns them. They overextend themselves.”
The latest Cure album, a shopping trip to the Sherman Oaks Galleria, a night at the movies, maybe even a car--these are seen as necessities during teen-age years. But the money to pay for them doesn’t necessarily come easily.
Chris McDaniel, a 17-year-old senior at Kennedy, is a salesman at Bullock’s in the Northridge Fashion Center. As part of the store’s training program, he also models clothes at fashion shows. McDaniel previously worked at Malibu Grand Prix in Northridge.
Learning to Save
“It seems that the money I make goes for gas and my phone bill,” he said, “plus the little I save. But, when I first started working, I was 15, and I didn’t save at all. When you’re young and you see money, you spend it.”
McDaniel, whose parents both have successful careers, said he has been learning the value of a dollar.
“I believe I’m spoiled,” he readily conceded. “I didn’t think that I was till I came to the public school system. The first nine years in private school, everyone was on the same social level. Now I’ve found that a lot of what I got from my parents, like a car when I was 15 and a trip to Europe, other people don’t get.”
But McDaniel said that enjoying the good life does not necessarily mean being lazy.
“I like money, without a doubt. When that paycheck started coming in, it felt good. But, even if I was financially set, I’d still work because I like it. I’d be bored otherwise.”
Work is not optional for some high school students. Eleanor Torguson, coordinator of the First Break program in the Los Angeles Unified School District, said some teen-agers help support a family.
“We’re not talking about youngsters who are hanging out down at the Galleria,” she said. “If they didn’t have this job, they wouldn’t be able to stay in school. People think of the San Fernando Valley as being an affluent la-la land, but there’s a lot of quiet poverty.”
Torguson said the First Break program, which takes job offers from employers and routes them to high school work-experience offices, community colleges and school district occupational centers, expects to fill 11,000 openings this spring and summer.
“Fast-food firms are our biggest employers,” she said, “with about 55% or 60% of the jobs. Then comes service industries, including places like Magic Mountain and the Universal Studios Tour. Someone who is bilingual and has good office skills can be placed pretty easily.”
Spokesmen for the federal Department of Labor and the state Employment Development Department said no figures are available on the number of working teen-agers in the Valley. The 1980 census found that, of about 1.4 million employed persons in Los Angeles, 81,000 were 16 to 19 years old.
A check of a few large employers found a favorable outlook this year for summer jobs for teen-agers. A McDonald’s representative said the fast-food giant is busy during the vacation months and has to replace older workers, particularly women with children, who take the summer off.
“It’s true a lot of people start at minimum wage,” the spokesman said, “but the first
review generally comes at 30 days. And the pay is generally higher in
low-unemployment areas. In most cases, there is at least a partial free meal.”
Andree Grember of the Magic Mountain personnel office said the Valencia amusement park has been hiring 100 teen-agers a week and expects to continue through mid-August. “Gas is costing less, and people are staying in the country,” she said. “That probably means more business for us.”
Young people must be at least 16 to work at Magic Mountain, like most other work places. Grember said starting pay is $3.50 an hour. Benefits include one free pass to the park each month, discounts on additional passes and merchandise, and a free meal a day for food-service workers.
Coveted Guide Jobs
Most jobs at the Universal Studios Tour, where about 350 young people will be hired this summer, also start at $3.50 an hour, employment coordinator Carol Fisher said. Coveted jobs as tour guides pay $4.25. As at Magic Mountain, employees receive free tickets and discounts on merchandise.
Work-experience counselors at area high schools agree that, when a teen-ager doesn’t work, the most likely reason is low starting pay rather than laziness on the youth’s part or lack of jobs.
“I don’t think kids are lazy at all,” said Wes Wilcox, counselor at San Fernando High. “The ones who work, I get back very good reports on their performance. But they’ll hear about somebody making $30 an hour for a skilled job, and they don’t understand why they have to start at $3.35.
“In a way they’ve got a point,” he continued, “because the minimum hasn’t gone up in eight years, and the cost of everything else goes up. But the kids have to learn the difference between skilled and unskilled. When they realize the difference, they go out and get the skills to get the good jobs.”
Wilcox said that, in the past school year, about 500 San Fernando High students took classes in job skills at the North Valley Occupational Center in Mission Hills. Those who need the credit toward their high school diploma can get it; others take the course as an extra.
“High schools tend to set their sights on everyone going to college,” Wilcox said, “but I’d guess that only 10% of our kids will go to college and be successful. There’s a real need to learn technical job skills, and we still have a long way to go, especially with our girls. I’d say that every girl is going to have to work some time, even if she marries. But so many don’t prepare themselves. They sell themselves short.”
Sonja Orozco of Pacoima, a 17-year-old junior at San Fernando High, works in a shoe store and takes a typing class at North Valley four afternoons a week.
“Last semester I kind of messed up in school, skipping classes and like that,” she explained, “so my grades were bad. The school told me I could get credit for taking outside classes. It sounded good, because my mom is a medical secretary, and I want to get into the secretarial field.”
Pragmatic View
Cary Baker of Canoga Park, a senior at Chatsworth High, thinks some young people focus too much attention on starting pay.
“I believe you have to have a job to get anywhere in life,” the 18-year-old said. “It doesn’t matter how low you have to start, because you can go up from there.”
Baker said he takes four classes in school and works 32 to 36 hours a week at his two jobs--a word processing stint on weekdays and a job at a hot dog stand on weekends. He recently bought a new pickup truck, and the combined payment on his loan and insurance is $340 a month.
“I paid for it myself and it’s good, because it teaches me responsibility,” he said.
Both Baker and Lisa Levy, 17, also a senior at Chatsworth High, believe that staying busy is one of the benefits of working. Lisa, of Northridge, has jobs in a department store and a fabric store.
“It’s not that difficult,” she said, “because I work at one of them on weekends and I work two days a week at the other. I’m an A-minus student, so I do OK. It’s not easy, but I feel it gives me experience for when I’m older and have to handle lots of things at one time.”
Levy said the jobs give her somewhere to go.
“It’s nice, especially in summer,” she said. “You don’t have to wake up in the morning and say, ‘What am I going to do today?’ ”
John Henderson, work-experience coordinator at Chatsworth High, estimated that about one of four students at his school has a job. He said he fills almost all the positions that open.
“The jobs that go begging are the ones that conflict with school schedules,” Henderson said. “They’ll want someone in the mornings, or to come in at lunch, and the kids can’t do it.”
For the thousands of young people entering the job market, working at an entry-level position means an introduction into the difficult world of meeting expenses and spending wisely.
“It seems very difficult for children to learn the value of money,” said Mary Aurit of Newhall, a mother who has been active for more than four years in Tough Love parent groups.
Learning Takes Time
“Part of the problem is that it takes time to learn anything. Then there are the expectations kids get from their parents, and there are the problems within the family. When I was divorced, I guess I wanted to make it up to my two sons. I tried to compensate by buying them things. I also wanted them to be equal with their friends. In junior high--that’s when the designer jeans were popular--I scrimped on myself so my kids would have the popular clothes.
“Then, when I remarried,” she continued, “my husband fell into it too, or maybe I led him into it. He wanted to start off the good new dad, so he bought them stereos and motorcycles and new water skis. When they started to expect it, we began to feel we were putting out and not getting anything in return.”
Aurit said that part-time jobs have been central to the learning of financial responsibility for her sons, now 20 and 16, and for the children of other Tough Love members.
“I see a lot more maturity in the kids who are working, even if it’s just a little,” she said.
Andrew Heiger, 25, a lay counselor who meets with teen-age groups in the north Valley, agrees that, when children do not know the value of a dollar, their parents’ teaching can be partly responsible.
“Parents have used money too much as a reward,” Heiger said. “It’s like with food. Parents start out giving a kid food as a reward, and the kid ends up with eating problems.”
Debbie Kleinman, a senior at Kennedy who works at a dry cleaners, said ruefully that her parents, though divorced, had not tried to compensate by buying her love. She calls herself “good at money,” in part because she hasn’t had it lavished on her. For example, at 17 she feels she is somewhat old to be without a car, but says she is stuck for now.
“I don’t think I’ll get a car soon,” Kleinman said. “I really want one, but my dad wants me to earn the money. I think he’s right. But this whole money thing is a problem. It’s a major topic among my friends--how we don’t have enough.”
Like many ambitious young people, Kleinman already has changed jobs once to earn more money. She previously was an assistant at a nursery.
Market Worker
Brian McLaughlin, a Kennedy junior who works as a supermarket box boy, said he is able to maintain a car partly because his father helps with repairs.
“Having a car costs more than I thought it would,” he said. “I work about 20 hours a week, and it seems like all my money goes for insurance. But you can’t get around without one.”
McLaughlin said his job has an advantage beyond the money he earns. He enjoys the people he works with. Before becoming a box boy, he grilled hamburgers at a fast-food stand.
“That’s where so many kids start,” said Manuel Fernandez, the work-experience coordinator at Kennedy. “It’s often minimum wage, and our minimum hasn’t changed in several years now. At $3.35 an hour, it’s not so attractive for a lot of kids. I put up notices for Carl’s Jr. and Arby’s and Jack-in-the-Box, and some kids turn up their noses. Getting a job is no problem if a kid really wants one. Getting a job that goes somewhere is tougher.”
