European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - September 13, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Do routinized jobs skew teen age Byal Vajtai Etzioni Washington Post Cdonald s is bad Lor your kids i do nol mean Iho fall panics and the who flour buns. Refer to Ifie jobs i Cert Aweis undertake mass producing these Choice lems As Many As two thirds of America s High school juniors and seniors now hold Down part Lime paying jobs Many a these arc in fast Lood chains of which Mcdonald s is the Pioneer trend seller and Symbol Al first such jobs May seem right Oul o the founding fathers educational manual or How o bring up Solf Rcd ant work ethic driven product arvo youngsters but in last those 0tas undermine school attendance and involvement Imparl few skills thai will be Yuselu in idler die. And simultaneously skew the values of icon agers especially their ideas about the Worth Ai a Dollar. It has been a longstanding american tradition Hal Youn Sleis ought to gel paying jobs. In folklore Lew pursuits Are More deeply revered than he newspaper route and the sidewalk lemonade stand. Here the youngsters Are to learn How Sweet arc the rails of labor and self Disei phew papers am delivered Early in the morning ram or Shin and the ways of Trade if you Price your Lomondo Loo High or too  Rogers Baskin Robbs Kentucky Fried Chicken Al Al. May at first seem nothing but a vast Extension Al the lemonade stand. They provide very Large numbers of teen jobs provide regular sep Raymonl. Pay quite Well compared to Many other teen jobs and in the modern equivalent of tailing Over a hoi Slove lest one s stamina. Closer examination however kinds the Mcdonald s kind of Job highly in educational in several ways. Far from providing  for  the lemonade stand or self discipline sell supervision and self scheduling the paper Roule. Most teen jobs Inoc Days Are highly is Mcturck what social scientists Call Nigmy routinized " True you still have to have the gumption to gel yourself Over to the hamburger stand but once you Don inc prescribed uniform your Lask is spelled out in minute detail the franc Timise prescribes the shape of the Coulee cups the weight size shape and color of the patties and the texture of the napkins if any fresh co foe is to be made every Highl minutes. And so on there is no room for initiative Cream Virly or even elementary rearrangement these Are Breeding grounds for robots working Ivi yesterday s Assembly lines no tomorrow s High tech posts there Are very few studies of Iho matter. One of the Lew is a 1984 study by Ivan Cowper and Bryan Shore Fraser. The study relies mainly on what teen agers write in response to questionnaires rather than actual observations of fast food jobs the authors argue Hal the employees develop Many skills such As How to operate a food preparation machine and a Cash Register. However Little attention is paid to How Long it lakes to acquire such a skill or whal its significance is whal does it matter if you spend 20 minutes to learn to use a Cash Register and then operate in what skill have you acquired it is a Long Way from learning to work with a Lane or Carpenter tools in Iha Olden Days or to program computers in the modern age. A 1980 study by . Harrell and . Wirtz found Hal. Among those students who worked Al least 25 hours per week while m school their unemployment rate four years later was half of that of seniors who did not work. This is an impressive statistic. It must be seen though together with the Linding that Many who begin As part time employees in fast food chains drop out of High school and Are lobbied up in the world of Low skill jobs. Some say that while Fiese jabs Are rather unsuited for College bound White Middle class youngsters. They Are Ideal for lower class  minority youngsters indeed minorities am Over represented in these jobs 21 percent of fast food employees. While it is True that these places provide income work and even some training to such youngsters they also lend to  their  status. Thoy provide no career ladders few marketable skills and undermine school attendance and involvement. The hours Are often Long. Among those 1a to 17. A third of fast food employees including some school drop outs labor More than 30 hours per week according to the charter Fraser study. Only 20 percent work 15 hours or less. The Resl Between 15 to 30 hours. Often the stores close late and alter closing one must clean up and tally up. In at Lucyl Montgomery county my where child labor would nol seem to be a widespread economic necessity 24 percent of the seniors Al Ono High school in 1935 worked As much As five to seven Days a week. 27 percent three to live there is just no Way such amounts of work will nol interfere with school Woik. Especially Homework. In an informal Survey published in the most recent yearbook of the High school 58 percent of the seniors acknowledged that their jobs interfere with their schoolwork. The charter Fraser study sees Merit in learning teamwork and working under supervision. The authors have a Point Here. However it must be noted that such learning is nol Automa locally educational or wholesome for example much of the supervision in fasl Lood places foans toward teaching one the wrong kinds of compliance Blind obedience or shared alienation with the Boss supervision is often both Light and woefully inappropriate. Today last food chains and other such places of work record shops Bowling alleys keep costs Down by having teens supervise teens with often no adult on the premises. There is no lather or Mother figure with which to identify to emulate to provide a role Model and guidance. The work culture varies from one place to another sometimes it is a lightly Tun shop Musl keep the Cash registers ringing some limes a raft or Loose pot party interrupted by customers. However Only rarely is Here a master to learn from or much world learning. Indeed far irom being places where solid adult work values Are being transmitted these Are places where All too often delinquent teen values dominate. Typically when my son Oren was dishing out ice Cream for Baskin Robbins in upper Manhattan his fellow teen workers considered him a sucker for not helping himself to the till. Most youngsters Felt they wore entitled to $50 Severance pay on their last Day on the Job the pay. Oddly is the part of Hie teen work world Hal is most difficult to evaluate. The lemonade stand or paper Roule Money was for your allowance in the old Days apprentices learning a Trade from a master contributed most it nol All of i hair income to their parents household today the teen pay May be Low by adult standards but it is alien especially in the Middle class spent largely or wholly by the teens. That is the youngsters . Al Arajj they arc High school kids and Are Letl with very substantial sum sol Money. Where his Money Goe is not quite Clear some use it to support themselves especially among the poor. More Middle class kids Sel some Money aside to help pay Tor College or save in for a major Purchase often a car. Bui Large amounts seem to flow to pay Lor Page 14 the stars and stripes jobs la Fatt Foo placet like guru to t have atm Louttit saturday i