I started working when I was 7 years old, howing weeds in my dads fields, I made 50 cents an hour, worked ten hours a day five days a week and 7 hours every Saturday, during the summer!
My first raise was to 80 cents an hour when I could drive a tractor the next year,
I was 12 before I found out anything about minimum wage, I filled in for a flagman on a Big A spreader and got $3.25 an hour for a week, 60 hours! Biggest check I'd ever seen. They loved me too, hard worker they said!
But there were plenty of people that would do that job for that price, I got lucky.
I farmed for my family, as well as others till I was 18, made anywhere from $4.50 an hour to $7.00. Never once made minimum wage again thanks to the experience I had when I was young. Kids today don't get that, minimum Wage screws that up by bringing older adults into the entry level job market, a market that was never meant to support a family, a job that can be replaced with automation! Just like the flagman has been replaced by tracking beacons and eventually GPS, I flagged lots of spray planes to, it was fun and we did it for little money, but it was more money than we had before, and we were kids! We didn't need it, it was gravy!