My First Job
And What It Taught Me

I started my first job with my sisters when I was 7 years old. Every Wednesday we delivered the local newspaper to a route the four of us shared. My oldest sister was 11, and my two younger sisters were 4 and 2 years old. My mom helped the younger two.
My youngest sister always made more in tips than the rest of us and I remember so many times my mom would say something about how people always thought she was so cute.
As a child I remember thinking that if you were cute (aka, pretty) you made more money. I was always the tall, lanky, nerd who had no fashion sense, and was continually having bad hair days, so I never expected to make much money.
It’s interesting how something as innocent as people giving a few extra cents to a 2 year old shaped my belief about money. How many other things have I formed a false belief around simply because of how they seemed to be?
I kept that job until I graduated from high school. 10 years of knocking on doors every Wednesday afternoon and asking people if they’d like to buy the local newspaper. No matter what the weather, I threw my paper bag over my shoulders, loaded it up with close to 100 newspapers, and walked, and walked, and walked. When I finished my route, I met up with one of my younger sisters and we walked home. Tired, hungry, usually with newsprint smears on our hands and face we would sit around the coffee table in the living room floor and figure out our earnings.
I have no record of how much money I made over those ten years. If I remember correctly we usually cleared close to $15 a week.
When we first started our route, way back when all four of us shared the same route, we pooled all our money for awhile and bought a TV that we put in the bedroom I shared with my older sister.
Other than that purchase, the money went to pizza, and bowling, and arcade games. I always had gas money to transport my friends around after I got my license at 16. And around the same time a bunch of us would go see the horror movies they showed at our local theater every weekend. I was always able to buy my own ticket and a giant pickle and a soda.
I bought an endless supply of teen magazines and ice cream sundaes at the local drugstore. And I always bought a huge stack of books from the Scholastic book sales.
$15 a week went a long way in the 70’s and 80’s.
Oh, that I would have known about investing.
Apple offered its initial public offering at $22 a share in December 1980. Its stock price has increased 111,000% since then. I’ll let you do the math on what a little knowledge could have given me.
I started my paper route so young it was just what I did. I never thought of not doing it. Every Wednesday I came straight home from school, loaded up my paper carrier bag and my dad gave me a ride to the start of my route.
I knew my customer’s names. I celebrated the births of their babies, and the deaths of their loved ones. When the copper miners went on strike I watched my sales fall, when December rolled around I watched my tips increase.
A few times I even had to deliver my route on Christmas Day! Those days were the best because not only did my sales increase, but my tips did too, and there was the added benefit of all the goodies my customers gave me.