High school jobs weren’t jobs, they were unpaid internships in chaos, sprinkled with a minimum wage consolation prize. You weren’t just flipping burgers or folding sweaters; you were starring in a low-budget sitcom where the script was written by caffeine, teen hormones, and total incompetence. Your coworkers were a cast of characters: the slacker, the overachiever, the manager who took the job way too seriously and you, stuck in the middle, pretending to care about expired coupons.
You clocked in for money, but stayed for the drama, the accidental power trips, and the wild customer interactions that felt like performance art. These weren’t jobs that built careers. They built stories. And emotional damage. And an immunity to weird smells.
So here they are: the high school jobs that felt less like work... and more like comedy shows with timecards. Spoiler alert: you deserved hazard pay.
1
Water Park Employee or Human Target? Hard to Say
“Worked a seasonal job at a water park: rotated between concessions, tickets, and ride ops. The crew made it bearable. Worst parts? People paying in coins, no shade on rides, and creepy grown men (I was 16) asking when I’d get in a bikini and join them.”
2
Fast Food Breakdown Simulator: Now With No Water or Breaks!
“The fast food job was a nightmare: constant manager turnover, understaffed shifts, and favoritism ruled. Know too much? No promotion for you. No breaks or meals if they didn’t feel like it, and you had to pay for water. If you worked alone, managers complained nonstop instead of calling for backup.”
3
Hotel Job or Unpaid Therapy Session?
“Worked at a local hotel. The problem were: unreliable coworkers and a manager who let them dump unwanted tasks and shifts on me. Felt pushed around.”
4
Popcorn Machine Gave Me Burns and Trust Issues
“Worked at a family-run movie theater doing everything: doorman, usher, cashier, cleaner. Got 2nd-degree burns cleaning the popcorn machine without gloves because they wouldn’t buy any.”
5
Night Shift Library: Slowly Losing My Mind at 2AM
“Night shift at a library (12am - 8am), first 6 months were without shift change FOR 6 DAYS A WEEK, and let me tell you, our brains ARE MEANT to sleep at night… otherwise things get dark.”
6
Installing Sprinklers in Texas Heat for Fun and No Profit
“First job was installing residential sprinkler systems in the summer of Texas heat in a new neighborhood for a contractor that built all the houses: No trees yet, no grass yet. S*CKED!”
7
Zoom Birthday Song for a Stranger: My Horror Debut
“During COVID, my first day onboarding included a virtual meeting with 20 people where I was forced to turn on my camera and sing happy birthday to a total stranger.”
8
Dishwashing in Racist Place for $5.15/hr
“I was a dishwasher at a restaurant for this racist POS making $5.15/hr. He even tried to short me on my check my last day working there.”
9
Stockroom Sweatshop and a Mom Who Kept the Paychecks
“Worked as a stocker/puller in a five story car parts department during summers starting freshman year of high school. No air conditioning, 40 hours a week, and my mom kept all the money.”
10
All Bad, But Totally Worth It for That Snowboard
“I was a busser at a crappy restaurant. Boss was a drunken pr*ck. Stayed just long enough to buy a new snowboard.”
11
Care Home Basement Laundry = Pure Teenage Trauma
“At 14, I worked weekends doing laundry in a care home basement: no windows, surrounded by bags of filthy, stinking sheets. The worst was dealing with soiled bedding from elderly residents.”
12
Hungry Cashier Fed Circus Peanuts by a Stranger
“I was a cashier at a local supermarket. It'd go right from school and I was always hungry. All that food… I remember once a woman fed me circus peanuts.”
13
McMisery: Now With Mean Customers and Worthless Raises
“McDonald’s: the classic teen job. Minimal hours, no benefits, worthless raises, and nonstop mean customers.”
14
One Hill. One House. Infinite Newspaper-Throwing Rage
“I worked delivering newspapers. I had one house on the top of a hill.”
15
Buffalo Paperboy: Just Me, the Ice, and the Regret
“Worked as a paperboy in Buffalo NY from 10-16 y/o. Nothing quite like delivering at 6 am in the winter in Buffalo.”
16
Cardboard Sweatshop: A Five-Day Breakdown in a Box Factory
“Right after high school, I worked brutal manual jobs. The worst? Five sweltering days in a cardboard box factory: no AC, 90s heat, raw hands, mind-numbing repetition. Overhead signs read ‘quality = future’.”
17
Bagboy Turned Biohazard Specialist on Day One
“I worked as a bagboy at a grocery store. On my first day, I had to clean a guy's Taco Bell meat-looking p00p off of a toilet seat. Without gloves.”
18
Detasseling Corn: Wet, Hot, and Infinitely Pointless
“As a typical Iowa teen, my first job was detasseling. It was hard, wet in the morning, hot in the afternoon. Some cornfields stretch for miles.”
19
Fired in 2 Weeks by the Health Code Queen
“Old boss expected me to memorize the whole menu and master the job in five minutes. Fired me after two weeks for “poor performance.” Joke’s on her, the place shut down due to her nasty food practices.”
20
Dish Pit Drama: Silverware Sabotage and Silent Rage
“Worked dish pit at an Italian spot in Michigan. One coworker did nothing but make my life harder: shoved filthy silverware and ladles into the washer without rinsing, so I had to redo everything. Meanwhile, I was hauling carts of dishes and running nonstop.”
21
Farm Labor for 50 Cents an Hour: Now With Extra P00P
“Made 50 cents an hour doing farm work for years: rock picking, manure shoveling, thistle digging, hay baling, silage forking, and scrubbing fly p00p off light bulbs. Brutal stuff.”
22
Warehouse Child Labor Summer
“Worked at a warehouse during one of the hottest summer. There were no windows for air. The roof had glass to let sunlight in. Everyone decided: “let the kid do all the work since he's young and we can boss him around”. Many nights I came home unable to eat and vommitting from being overheated.”
23
Beer Tantrums and Baseballs: My Concession Stand Origin Story
“First job was running concessions at baseball games. You can tell who the alcoholics are because they get real p*ssy when you don't give them one last beer in the 9th inning.”
24
Paper Route or City Survival Challenge?
“Paper route! Yes it sucked. I lived in the roughest neighborhood in the city at that time. I had to avoid getting jumped and robbed when I was collecting money.”
25
Grease, Harassment, and a Side of Fries
“Worked at McDonald's for one college semester. The smell of grease clung to everything: clothes, skin, soul. Worse than that? My manager was a sexual harasser. Daily b*tt pats, body pressed against me; zero boundaries.”
26
Furniture Store: Where the Chairs Were Nicer Than the Coworkers
“Worked at a wooden furniture store: unloaded trucks, stocked shelves, helped customers. It was tough work, and some coworkers (especially customer service and truck drivers) were j*rks.”
27
Painting Houses at 6AM Like a Geriatric Ghostbuster
“I was a painter in the summer. We always started our days at 6am. Not waking up, we were painting houses at 6am to beat the summer heat.”
28
Hot, Loud, Miserable: The Factory Starter Pack
“I worked in a factory when I was 15, mostly cleaning and painting machines. It was early morning, loud place, very hot in the summer.”
29
The Pastrami Still Haunts My Dreams
“I cleaned out a food truck every day after school. I had to store away the leftover food, clean the utensils and counter, and prep for the next day. I can still smell the pastrami after all these years.”
30
7 Pizza Crusts at a Time… and 0 Will to Live
“My first job was sitting in front of a conveyor belt stacking 7 pizza crusts at a time at a pizza factory in 1979.”