How much would you pay a teen helper?

[HilltopDaisy]

What would you consider a fair beginning wage to offer a 17 year old, for helping around the farm? This kid has experience around animals and really come across well in his e-mail (answered an ad I placed). I won't be expecting him to work alone, ever, and nothing will be difficult. Mostly cleaning pens, helping me move things around, maybe putting in a few fence posts, stuff like that. It will be an 8 hour day, every couple of weeks. Thanks.

[freeinalaska]

It would depend on the area you live in and the wages expected there. I usually pay $8 to $10 and hour for teenage help.

[fin29]

Same here.

[tlrnnp67]

I'd pay him what I thought the job was worth, i.e. what would I expect to be paid if I were the one being hired. Age shouldn't factor into it. If you are lucky enough to find a good worker, paying him market value will show him you respect his work ethic.

If you are able to establish a good working relationship, perhaps you can eventually trust him to look after your place and animals for a few days if you want to get away.

[fordy]

.............10 to 15 per hour ! Based upon your personal observations and the quality of his work ethic . , fordy

[THETOOLMAN]

I pay $10.00 per hour & give a GOOD LUNCH + plenty of water

[Peace n Quiet]

my 17 yo son makes $20 per hay wagon he unloads - with a helper. (if another teen helps, they each get $20) All other farm chores he gets between 10 - 15 dollars an hour. Depends on how messy the job is. He takes his own lunch & water and has his own transportation.

[HilltopDaisy]

Thanks everyone. The work will not be as difficult as haying, not even close. I'm not interested in paying "by the job" as I hope this turns into a long term thing, so hourly works much better. I'm thinking $8.50 to start, and as he proves himself, more $$.

By the way, I placed an ad on craigslist at 4 PM and received 5 responses in less than 3 hours.

[HilltopDaisy]

Originally Posted by tlrnnp67

I'd pay him what I thought the job was worth, i.e. what would I expect to be paid if I were the one being hired. Age shouldn't factor into it. If you are lucky enough to find a good worker, paying him market value will show him you respect his work ethic.

If you are able to establish a good working relationship, perhaps you can eventually trust him to look after your place and animals for a few days if you want to get away.

Sounds like you have had some good experiences. Not the case for me.

My experience has been that I need to be right on top of a teen, otherwise I have to redo the work that I paid to have done. Age definitely is a factor.....

[bqz]

$10.00 an hour feed him and water him.

[Shygal]

Some of this pay here makes me wonder why I bothered to go to school to become an RN, when people moving hay make as much as I do.

[radiofish]

Well I wind up getting the 18 to 22 years old youngsters from down at the university to do my grunt work.

I pay $10.00 to 15.00 per hour (depends on the job) and supply lunch and beverages (sodas/ water) for them. I do watch what they are doing, by assisting them to make sure they do it correctly. Otherwise, I have had to find other workers due to some poor work ethics - not showing up on time, taking too long of breaks, and drinking beer on the job. After the work is over, then it's Miller tiime!!!!

[marvella]

Originally Posted by bqz

$10.00 an hour feed him and water him.

that's what i pay. if it's a big job over several days i also take them to graze through the local ryans when it's done.

[meanwhile]

Around here there is a wide range of pay amounts. Some teens are paid only $5.00 per hour by some folks for lighter jobs or jobs that are not messy. Since work here on our place is hot, messy sometimes or heavy work like hauling chips in wheel barrow, we pay $8.00 per hour up to age 17, then $9.00 per hour but if the teen works as hard as the older people, we pay them the same: equal pay for equal work = so 2 of the teens who help us here make $12.00 per hour just as the older college age boys do.

We provide the lunch sandwich, water and kool ade and we provide all the tools. One teen who brings his own weed whacker, we pay him for the gas and string too.

Many teenagers are good workers and I think it is good to give them the opportunity to work and learn good work practices. When we have a new teen worker on our farm, and they do not seem to know what to do, we give them a "lesson" or our sons do and we try to teach them how to work. Usually they "self weed" and will not come back if they do not want to work hard. The hard good workers will say "thank you" at the end of the day and ask to come back.

good luck

[THETOOLMAN]

Originally Posted by Shygal

Some of this pay here makes me wonder why I bothered to go to school to become an RN, when people moving hay make as much as I do.

Thats no kidding. I had a guy and his son work for me to paint my KENNEL I payed him $10.00 hr He payed his helper! He had a masters degree in math!

[mommagoose_99]

We have had two teenage helpers this year. They were 17 and 19. They have very short attention spans and would want to quit working after an hour or two. We paid them $5 an hour. They had no previous experience and we had to watch them like a hawk, especially when weeding
. Would like to pay them more next year and get them on a schedule so more would be accomplished. We will have them picking rock this fall after school. They mostly weeded and picked tomatoes. The older one also helped move a lot of wood and ran the log splitter.
Linda

[myhorsejack]

As was said many times I agree it depends on the person. If they are worth $10 then pay them that.

As for loading hay, its worth $20 per hour if you working at it like you should be. No offence but working a day here and there to unload hay is worth the $20. There is a big diffrence in the amount of physical labor and the fact that you are being paid per job, not 40hrs per week or more. My hats are off to nurses, they are an amazing group of people who are underpaid for all they do. But loading hay is not a walk in the park.

cd

[onthespot]

I'm an RN too, and work home care, which is more bottom of the pay scale, and the past two weeks have been REALLY busy because two of my patients got sick and needed a lot of extra visits, and I think I averaged around 2k/wk the past two weeks, WAY more than I usually make, but I doubt you could do any hay unloading/pen cleaning job and get paid that much. Nursing is very flexible and I find it to be prone to a lot of "windfall" weeks if you want to work yourself to death because you need the money, at least in So Cal. Not sure about things where you live.

Originally Posted by Shygal

Some of this pay here makes me wonder why I bothered to go to school to become an RN, when people moving hay make as much as I do.

[Le Petit Norman]

I am usually paid $10 an hour with food and water or soda provided for weeding, chopping wood, haul wood ... Sometimes I've got an extra $10 for my gas. I am not a teenager anymore but sometimes working a few hours on Saturday or Sunday just pay for the livestock feed and this is always welcome as all of you know. I found a lot of job through the grapevine too it seems that people in fancy suburban who are pleased with your work spread your name pretty easily so if you find a good worker who is used to do that can of job he will probably have more chance to "choose" is job than other so a fair pay is probably the best choice ever. I always like the $10 an hour plus bonus if the job is well done !!!

[Alice In TX/MO]

$10 is too much. I've proven it over and over. Start them at $7 or $8, and let them earn an increase or the opportunity to find a new job.