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My first job was a dotcom startup who heard via social connections I was a bright high school student who could program. I think I was paid $15/hr to write Windows GUI code. In retrospect I think they were just happy for the cheap labor and I didn’t know any better. There was no mentorship or any other useful growth to make up for the low pay.

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On the other hand, you were probably also learning on the job, which meant they were paying you to learn. Not a bad arrangement, especially if they did not demand senior-level code from you.

I was also fortunate to get paid to learn web development in the 90s. This was a work-study job so I was barely paid anything (I think it was something like $100/wk). But I was thrilled to be given a computer in an air-conditioned office. The alternative was to do some other dumb work-study job like making sure students swiped their meal plan cards when they walked into the cafeteria. Although it took me awhile, that job is what set me on the path I’m still on now.

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