Personal Thoughts on Teenage Employment

An increasing number of teenagers flood the modern workforce each year. With hundreds of businesses searching for potential employees in an array of fields, teenagers like me commence employment during the school-year. These facts directly relate to my decision to work as a sales associate at sporting goods store and the effects the decision has instigated upon my life. The components of my occupation, such as the employment hours and the physical demands, have created an imbalance in both the domestic sector and the educational sector. Thus, my choice to join the workforce has resulted in numerous educational, social, and economic consequences that changed my outlook on life.

To begin, my job's most evident effect on my life appears in the educational sector. Over the course of my employment, I realized that my work's foremost effect dealt with a loss of homework time and study time that were so copious prior to my employment. For example, because of my job I only have an hour and half each day to complete my homework assignments, an insufficient time frame that very often causes late-night study sessions and incomplete assignments. Before I started working, I could easily finish all of my assignment since I had more than four hours to complete all of work. However, since my job created a paucity of study time, I quickly experienced the pains associated with a career and an education.

In addition to the lack of time for schoolwork, my grades have deteriorated quickly following my employment. Initially, as I tried to balance work and school, my grades plummeted as a result of the lack of study time and inability to put in effort into my schoolwork. In one instance, I found myself scrambling to complete a genetics project at midnight on the morning on which I had to hand it in. With my mind exhausted from work and my body craving for sleep, I compiled onto a poster whatever I could. My efforts, despite the reason why I could not complete the assignment, awarded me with a barely "passing" grade. Such an occurrence reappeared many times in other classes and on my report card, where my previously perfect set of grades was now stained with scores that failed to reflect my abilities. Before, I had a wealth of time for my schoolwork since it was the core of my life. However, my decision to work forced me to juggle two equally demanding components of life, which in turn obliged me to deduct time from my educational component in order to satisfy the demands of my job.

Furthermore, my decision to work has transformed my schooling into a hassle, not an enjoyable experience. My regular job demands much work mentally and physically with large amounts of mathematical and legal analysis and quick runs from one location to another, causing exhaustion and sleep depravation. This in turn has resulted in an inability on my part to pay attention or participate in class, thus leading me to trouble following short naps during lessons. The mental hardships of employment have immense consequences on my ability to perform well in school and turn my schooling into a physical burden.

Moreover, my decision to work has drastic effects on my social life. With much time consumed by my part-time job, I find myself unable to adequately balance my time between work and the people in my life, mainly my family. For example, my work schedule forces me to skip numerous birthdays of family members and leads to my routine absence from gatherings because of my obligation to appear at work, an action that has noticeable consequences on my level of closeness with my extended family. With little time to spare in order to visit grandparents and other relatives, I feel the distance grow between me and other family members simply because I cannot visit them. Additionally, my employment has also deprived me of the time that I had before to spend with friends. Friends are a crucial component of high school life and the fact that my employment prevents me from meeting them and keeping in touch with them has grave emotional effects. For instance, my habitual deficiency to appear at meetings of friends has caused some of them to reach the conclusion that I spend all of my free time working, in turn creating a situation where I had slowly became disconnected from all of my friends. Such a frightful disconnection resulted in gloomy moods and a sense of hopelessness, which drastically lowered my social health.

Also, with work consuming my free time, I found it impossible to attend meetings and events of numerous clubs which included me as a member. In one instance, my responsibility to appear at work on time forced me to cancel a World Affairs Club field trip to a United Nations convention that I had been looking forward to attending. My inability to immerse myself in the clubs and activities caused me to feel disconnected from the happenings at school. With little left to do outside of school besides work, the world became too small and too dull in my eyes.

Finally, the economic effects rooted in my employment have given me a taste of the world that I live in. As I began working, I quickly realized that an economical viewpoint on things would be the way that would lead to prosperity. In one instance, I found myself refusing to cash a paycheck because I concluded that the capital I earned should be put away for true future necessities, such as college, transportation, insurance, and rent, unlike false necessities like the newest pair of shoes. I feel the effect that my decision to work had on me, since it forces me to think about how I would spend my own money as opposed to money that my parents give me. With my toils for the money in mind, I find that my previous economic decisions of spending money on material goods I needed at the moment would not allow me to survive in the real world.

Moreover, another economical effect on my life involves the independence associated with a personal income. With my own resources, I discovered that I did not depend on my family for the handling of money and the purchasing of goods. In one instance, I found myself investing capital in my car and my room out of my own pocket, without needing authorization or help from my family. Such independence proves to be priceless in the real world and transforms the teenage personality into an adult character. Also, another economic effect proves to be a new awareness of the ways through which society and the government function. With a new job, I immediately began paying attention to the taxation policies of the United States. For example, at one time I spent a lunch break observing my paycheck, busying myself with calculations concerning the percentage of taxes deducted from the gross amounts, union fees, and other charges. Having a job at such a young age informed me early of things to come. I became aware of taxation and the difference between concepts like gross amount and net amount. Such ideas may seem insignificant now, but those ideas will dictate my life and my prosperity in the future.

In conclusion, the decision to work has affected me in the educational, social, and economic sectors and has changed my outlook on life. With a new challenge of balancing work and school on my shoulders, I taught myself the concepts of responsibility and felt my work build up character. Teenagers do not simply apply for jobs for its economic benefits, but for the practice and the valuable lessons which it teaches. From my own experience, I know that a job allows a teenager to evolve into an adult and an informed citizen. Employment banishes the dependent child out of a person and shows them the path to prosperity, becoming a key component in the lives of many.