More than just petty cash: Young workers are working “to live, not to play”
Yoshawn Smith is 24 and works in the restaurant industry. He started at Panda Express when he was 15. Now, he works at a popular downtown Los Angeles restaurant. He thinks the stereotype that younger employees only get jobs for extra money, or “chump change,” is ridiculous.
“I don’t see anyone doing that,” he explained. “I’m definitely not, neither is anyone else. Every paycheck we get, we’re broke. We get the next one, we’re broke again.”
Smith works to provide for his family — him, his wife, and their 3-year-old son. He earns about $720, every two weeks. That means he takes care of his family on about $1400 a month.
“It goes to rent, food, the phone bill, landscaping for the yard, dog food, clothes if Dario needs it, bike repairs if I have the chance to do so, supplies,” he said. “It goes to a lot, just to keep the house up and running.”
Smith writes a check for $650 each month for rent alone. Over 40 percent of his budget is dedicated to housing, and he’s not alone. A recent study by the Ziman Center for Real Estate found that median percentage of income Angelenos dedicate to rent is 47 percent. The recommended allocation is far lower, just 30 percent.
Smith’s budget is tight, leaving less than $100 each month for emergencies.
I asked Smith — does he think his employer treats him any differently because he’s younger than his co-workers?
“They do treat us a little different because they don’t think we know as much as we do,” Smith said. “If we were the same age as they are, they’d treat us a lot differently and have more respect for us. Because we’re younger, they assume we don’t have ambition, like we aren’t able to find something better, so they treat us like they own us.”
California recently voted to raise the minimum wage — to $15 an hour — a move supposedly designed to help people like Smith, but he’s worried it may have unintended consequences.
“I hope it’s not you get paid $15 an hour, but you work a quarter of the hours — but you work a quarter of the hours, paid the same amount,” he said. “I hope you can keep your schedule because now it seems like a raise doesn’t even matter anymore — you could get a dollar raise, but if your hours are cut they can keep paying you the same amount.”
Raises, he says, look good on paper, but for employees? Not so much. Smith explained that he could still be living paycheck to paycheck even after the minimum raise increase if they cut his hours. This would put him -- and his family -- at risk.
48 percent of workers in Los Angeles County between 18 and 34 — workers like Smith — use their earnings to support their families. Less than 1 percent say they use their wages only for going out.
“They have a family, they have other responsibilities as well,” said UCLA researcher Jeylee Quiroz. “I really hope we drive that home.”
As UCLA researcher Saba Waheed explained it, Los Angeles used to be a manufacturing city, meaning low-skill workers could get good manufacturing work for reasonable wages.
“Now, young people are under-paid in the service economy,” she explained.
It’s hard being a young worker, said researcher Janna Shadduck-Hernandez.
“Historically, young people have always been used to fill labor market needs,” she explained. “They’re also the first to be fired when there isn’t a need.”
That’s bad news for Yoshawn Smith, especially because he doesn’t even want to work in the restaurant industry — he does it out of necessity. His dream is to be a photographer.
But for now, that dream is saved for freelance gigs and fun. He has a family to take care of, and working a low-wage job is better than no job at all.
Listener letters
I was curious what your first jobs were and what you used the money for. So I asked on Twitter and on Facebook — and you told me all sorts of things.
@carlamjavier My first job was pushing carts at Target. Soul crushing. Bought Casablanca with my first pay check. Not too much has changed 🦄
— Kevin Lukacs (@kclukacs) February 16, 2016
“I was a courtesy clerk at Krogers,” listener Carolina wrote on Facebook. “I used the money for going out to eat and hanging out with friends in high school.”
“Driver and dispatch for a free late night shuttle service on campus,” listener Marek wrote on Facebook. “Money went toward food, books, transportation, and music shows.”
“I worked at a local library shelving books and running children’s programs,” listener Greg wrote on Facebook. “I then used the money to buy a guitar and get all the girls. The second part never happened.”
