Obama unveils efforts to get teens first jobs
ASSOCIATED PRESS / 2008
As a teenager President Barack Obama’s first job was scooping ice cream at this Baskin- Robbins shop in Honolulu.
WASHINGTON >> President Barack Obama says his unglamorous first job scooping ice cream taught him valuable lessons about responsibility and hard work.
He wants the same experience for other teenagers, particularly those without resources, and is launching a summer opportunities project to help young people land a first job that can teach them similar lessons and help send them down the right path.
The private sector, all levels of government, community groups and schools have pledged to help teenagers get their first jobs this summer.
“Scooping ice cream is tougher than it looks,” Obama said Thursday in an essay on the LinkedIn professional networking site. “Rows and rows of rock-hard ice cream can be brutal on the wrists. … I was less interested in what the job meant for my future and more concerned about what it meant for my jump shot.”
The job at a Baskin-Robbins in Honolulu “wasn’t exactly glamorous, but it taught me some valuable lessons,” Obama wrote. “Responsibility. Hard work. Balancing a job with friends, family and school.”
LinkedIn has pledged to connect millions of leaders of small and medium-size businesses with organizations that help young people. The Department of Labor and the Corporation for National and Community Service together have committed $35 million to the effort.
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Cities including Los Angeles, Seattle and Charlotte, N.C., have promised to help thousands of teenagers. The federal budget plan Obama sent Congress this month includes $6 billion, nearly double the previous year’s request, to help more than 1 million young people get their first job.
Obama said landing that first job is already difficult, but even harder for the 1 in 7 Americans between the ages of 16 and 24 who aren’t in school or are unemployed. The new summer jobs initiative seeks to further the goals of Obama’s “My Brother’s Keeper” program to help boys and young men of color.
As unglamorous as scooping ice cream was, Obama said it gave him a chance to contribute to his community.
“And while I may have lost my taste for ice cream after one too many free scoops, I’ll never forget that job, or the people who gave me that opportunity, and how they helped me get to where I am today,” he said.
15 responses to “Obama unveils efforts to get teens first jobs”
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Socialists like the President and the corrupt Democrat Party forget what it’s like to be a young person. It is hard to get a job if you are a teenager starting on your first job, and getting harder when they mandate a higher and higher minimum wage and making it a “living wage”. Obama should listen to himself when he is working hard to bring America down with one terrible decision after another, “I was less interested in what the job meant for my future and more concerned about what it meant for my jump shot.”
A lot of kids nowdays are spoiled and get everything they need from their parents, especially if they are well off or wealthy. Not sure why you’re criticizing Obama for encouraging kids to get a job in order to build their resume at a young age and get them motivated early. From my personal experience working in fast food, that experience probably showed me how to work hard more than anything else. Usualy you appreciate what you have after you work hard to earn your money instead of having it handed to you for nothing.
krusha, check out Winston’s comment below, he gets what I was talking about. It isn’t just Obama’s fault, it’s our representatives and the corrupt party they belong to, and the weak Republicans in Congress that created this terrible job market for teens, and especially minority teens. When Socialists say they are going to help you, it usually turns out badly.
When I was about 16 the only jobs were at the Cannery, pineapple fields on Lanai, and gas stations. Because of a program for kids like myself, they created jobs at military bases. A bunch of us got to work on the Beach at Fort DeRussey. Was a great experience and really helped us. This is a good thing!
What a “nothing” article. Nothing said about how the $6 billion taxpayer dollars is to be spent. Nothing said about who is to receive the $6 billion taxpayer dollars. Nothing said about who will distribute the $6 billion taxpayer dollars or why. Sounds like just another government “feel good” program which will not accomplish anything but waste taxpayer dollars.
Hilarious. Was this article written by the Onion? What work ethic? More importantly, this presidential effort follows closely on the heels of his effort to reduce the chances for teen jobs, the minimum wage increase. By jacking up starting wages, businesses have no choice but to eliminate as many of those jobs as they can. Heck uv a job, Baracky!
Yeah, pretty ridiculous. The article it the 2nd iteration in the SA, just has a different headline. And how did little Barry contribute to his community by working at Baskin Robbins? He performed a service for his employer and his employer paid him for the labor. And why is 6 billion of taxpayer money necessary to create jobs. Get the government off the backs of small businesses and quit fiddling with wages. That will increase job opportunity while saving money for the shrinking number of people who actually pay taxes.
Yes. Don’t confuse these jobs with what’s needed to raise a family or even to support oneself entirely. Lower the minimum wage so employers can afford to hire teenagers for these starter jobs.
Gee, when I was 14, I volunteered as a general helper with the East Bay Regional Park District. They paid me in hot dogs and sodas. Later, when I applied as a lifeguard, they knew me and that I worked hard. My summer work with EBRPD over the next eight years helped me to pay my way through UC Berkeley. Opportunities are there for people who are willing to take them.
Cellodad, Ms Cataluna wrote on plantation life in Hawaii and I remember the day following my 13th birthday in July, I was working in the sugar cane field with my hoe removing weeds (hoe hana gang). Hawaii did have an exemption for agricultural student laborers for age 13. Yes, my bango was 7676 and compensation $0.86 per hour, and for a student who had just completed the 8th grade, it was huge, $6.88 per 8 hours of work in 1956.
Wow, good pay! in 1964 was only getting 65 cents an hour, and that was a raise!
Yup. In ’66 we were getting as lifeguards at beach areas $1.70/hr. Of course, some weeks we were working 60 hours. That wen’t up to $2.35 the following year. Then, as a Head Lifeguard, I was making the princely sum of about $$3.35. But you know? It was enough to pay for school and living expenses along with scholarships, work-study, and grants-in-aid.
Of course, the worst job was when I was 16, living in a tent in the Teton National Wilderness about 50 miles from the road head spraying pine trees for lodgepole pine beetles 10 hours a day, six days a week for $0.25 per tree. Lots of money, terribly dangerous working conditions for a 16 year-old.
Most kids today don’t want a job… they want a position. There are lots of “jobs” out there that just go begging, you just have to get up off your lazy behind and go looking for them… be creative find a need and fill it. To quote John Wayne: “Son, I’m not giving you a job. I’m paying a days wages for a days work. No bodies giving anybody anything… you’re gona earn it”.
Not at $15.00 an hour.
And SA, he admitted to his bomb making terrorist ghost writer friend that he stole from Baskin and Robins while he was working there, and the ghost writer was nice enough to write about it in his book.