A few years ago, I decided to accept a minimum wage job that paid $10.50/hour.
At the time, I was just a teen struggling to put herself through college on her own. And though I was used to being paid significantly more than the minimum wage, I was in a tight spot and in no position to be picky.
So when I saw that a delivery company was hiring seasonal helpers to make Christmas deliveries easier for drivers, I applied — and was hired on the spot.
It was a whole new world for me.
For my first day on the job, my brother dropped me off because I didn’t even own a car yet.
Now, even though I was already paying for college out-of-pocket then, I look back and realize how working that job opened my eyes to the fact that I grew up with privilege.
When I was little, I never had to worry about what I was going to eat or wear — my parents gave me everything I needed until I was old enough to make my own money and pay my own bills. In many ways, I had it easy.
But I digress.
A mile in their shoes
When the driver pulled up to our meeting spot, the truck was full to bursting with packages. And just like that, the day had begun. I didn’t have a clue about what to expect.
But I soon discovered some harsh realities about working a minimum wage job, outside, in the freezing cold.
It was brutal.
When the driver and I had to make deliveries on Main Street, he would park the massive delivery truck in a side street and load me up with as many packages as I could carry.
I then had to run across streets, trying not to get run over while searching desperately for unfamiliar addresses on a tight schedule.
Commercial deliveries were the worst because all the packages needed signatures — I couldn’t just drop them off.
I’ll never forget the time when I was making my deliveries on a bitterly cold December day, and the packages blew away in the wild, landing scattered all over the frozen sidewalk.
By the time I had collected them, my hands were so cold that the touchscreen scanner I needed didn’t recognize my fingerprint anymore.
In short, it was an awful job.
And yet, it wasn’t at the same time.
Why? Because it taught me valuable lessons, and lessons are always worth the price of a temporary period of struggle and pain.
So what was the biggest lesson I learned?
Easy.
I learned to never again look down on people who work a minimum wage job.
I’m in awe of people who work these jobs now. As I found out the hard way, it’s often incredibly challenging work, and the people who do that work deserve heartfelt thanks and higher pay.
The second biggest lesson I learned from that job is that I’m capable of much more than I thought.
Now, to many people, that’s a weird lesson to learn from my experience. To them, getting into an elite college or making millions in their bathrobe is really difficult and worth being proud of, not delivering packages late at night in the freezing cold.
And I get that. I used to think that way too.
Sure, getting into Yale is hard, but it doesn’t mean working a minimum-wage job isn’t also difficult.
It’s a different kind of difficult, but it’s challenging nonetheless.
Even though I was paid very little, or maybe because I was paid very little, I’m proud that I got up in the morning and showed up when it would have been easier to quit.
The takeaway
So many people work minimum-wage jobs all day, every day, and get no credit for it. Ever.
In fact, they’re often the object of criticism and ridicule.
People tell their kids, “Go to college, Junior, because you don’t want to end up working that kind of job.”
Now, I do think parents who say these things want the best for their kids — I really do. But there’s no need to put other people down for earning a low wage.
The fact is, minimum wage earners work extremely hard.
They work way harder than I do now, sitting in a comfortable home writing articles, that’s for sure.
And I’ll admit, before working such a job myself, I would never have thought that. Like many others, I thought people who worked these jobs were just unmotivated or lazy.
I couldn’t have been more wrong, though. And I think it’s important to realize that just because a job doesn’t pay a lot doesn’t mean it’s not difficult or valuable.
As I’ve discovered, walking a mile in someone’s shoes can be eye-opening.
We depend on each other to do our respective jobs more than we realize, so let’s not trivialize or downplay anyone’s role in society.
Let’s respect everyone, regardless of what they do or how much they earn.
Always.
Note: This article first appeared on Medium and was republished with the author’s permission. It has been lightly edited.
