I know you were trying to make a point, but I cannot help but laugh at this. You are over analyzing. Money = power and choices. How do you get money? Employ the skills you have. If you have no skills, learn them! How? From a job!
The funny thing is my first job was actually given to me, I wasnt really looking for one as I had not thought about working. When the job was offered to work in a restaurant part time on the weekends, I took it! I got free food, met lots of people and learned the value of a dollar. After that my cousin had a friend who got us both jobs helping to clean big retail stores at night. That was loads of fun, paid more and opened the door to more opportunities. Yes, it wasnt all fun and games, there were shitty times too as you learn what doing a good job is and is not. But I learned.
Kids today need the same chance I got, not the law holding them back. If you dont want to work, fine! Just sit on ass until you are 21 or older, I dont care. Live on welfare all your life. Makes no difference to me.
Trying to make a point.. no I made a point, you are just to ignorant to comprehend it. Which is why you have shown you are full of so much shit! I am not over analyzing anything. I am telling you a reality that many kids live or lived, using my own personal experience. Something you have made clear you don't understand because you are walking around with your nose up in the air, thinking you where someone special.
You are trying to tell us that your priority at the age of 12 was to learn skills so you can be better employed? Your "I got free food, met a lot of people and learned the value of a dollar" is the adult NOW speaking trying to justify your previous comments about lazy kids of today, not the naïve little boy you where at the age of 12. But you are sitting here implying that is why you "chose" to work at the age of 12. Guess what, there are still a lot of jobs that kids of today can do at the age of 12, that are not against labor laws. And there are a lot of kids of today, who do those jobs.
The sad part is, you are still naïve as fuck today, because you think your first job offer, at the age of 12 was not a setup by your parent's. That the owner's of this restaurant just offered you a job because they "believed" you would be a good choice because of your 12 year old character and work ethic. I guarantee your parent's where involved long before you ever where offered a job to work in that restaurant on weekends. Today, You are still oblivious to the fact that they made the choice for you, to teach you responsibility. You just allowed your parents to stay in the shadows because you agreed to take the job offer so they didn't have to show their hand. (whisper: you didn't have a choice)
But Basically, you are just pushing the bullshit right wing, we should be able to exploit child labor under the disguise of "they need the same chance I got"... Yet, working at that restaurant, working cleaning offices didn't give you skills that lead to high paying jobs. Your first few jobs, didn't' teach you "how to do the job right", it didn't teach you work ethics.. those are lessons taught by parents, not employers. you are just to stupid to realize it was your parents behind the whole thing, teaching you. And still some how don't grasp, that they are lessons that can be taught without exploiting child labor.
For the past couple decades, what leads to high paying jobs, in most cases, is education. Specially since actual skills isn't really a focus now days for the younger generation, because they don't push trade skills anymore, they push education, and employers require degrees. Education is something, working at to young of an age, negatively effects. Specially for those that don't come from a family that can afford to send them to collage. Not to mention the safety aspect of it, etc. And this "just sit and wait till the age of 21" IS A BULLSHIT LIE... labor laws of today allow kids to start working at the age of 14 with strict restriction, which loosen each year after that. It's not because of the kids not wanting to work.. It's many of the employers refusing to hire anyone under 18 because they can't exploit those under 18 as easily because of the laws that protect them. So you are oblivious of reality, or you are just another right wing mouth breather, trying to misdirect, and blame kids, so you can find a way to exploit children.
All you have proven here is you are full of shit and have zero clue of kids today, and just how ignorant you are. Kids today aren't lazy, and those that are is 100% due to parenting. Most kids of today, don't want to not work.. But the focus of today is safety of children, and education.. Education being a huge part because that is what society has pushed on to the last few generations to get a decent paying job today, they don't push trade skills, if it was about skills, trade skills would be at the top, before education. But today, no education, no collage degree, you will have a difficult time finding a job that pays a livable wage, unless you find a trade skill that allows you to do on the job training. The problem is, that very few trade skill options are presented to kids of today unless their parents are already in those trade skills.