I personally think that's not a terrible offer. $25/hour to stand around clicking pictures? It's a lot easier than most work people do for minimum wage, first, and secondly it's not like you have massive film costs or need a ton of technical knowledge anymore. 99% of the shots people want can be accomplished with stock or relatively cheap lenses, too; you don't have to be a gear-head who spends all their profits on their kit for no appreciable difference in how much people are willing to pay.
Most of us don't have $500-1000 to pay a photographer so we simply don't bother and rely on friends and family for it. I might consider getting professional pictures of my family if it didn't cost the obscene amount that it does. There's probably a market on the volume, low-cost side that simply isn't being tapped because photographers are often such dilettantes.
For someone who wants to break into photography, finding a steady supply of low-paid jobs to build up the portfolio and their name recognition for word-of-mouth marketing is probably the best way to go. You wouldn't want to be running at these wage levels for more than a year, but to start, well, there's certainly worse paths.