Really, don't blame it on your age. I knew better at 15. The first employer I had was a guy doing MLM who wanted me to accept a lower wage now for big riches

Really, don't blame it on your age. I knew better at 15. The first employer I had was a guy doing MLM who wanted me to accept a lower wage now for big riches later. He talked a great game, but if he was so sure my work would make him rich later, as the boss it's his job to make the call and make an investment by paying me reasonably from the start. If I miss out on 'big riches' later on, no big whoop. Of course he never made any money because MLM is a scam. A year later I was 16 and working for his brothers company, a remailing company that actually provided a valuable service and had a solid business model. Guess what, they didn't try to get me to work for almost nothing! Like any real business, they realized the value I would bring and paid me accordingly. I designed their newsletter, wrote an application to track serial numbers on their postage metering machines when the government started requiring that (which was fun because they gave me 24 hours notice that they needed it to comply with federal law, but I think it surprised them too). When they wanted me to make a web-based application for their sales people to work up price quotes for prospective clients I met with the owner and told him this was above and beyond my part-time after-school job duties as 'anything with a computer guy' and proposed doing it as a separate contract, he went for it and I made what was (to teenaged me) a buttload of money on it. Real businesses understand that salaries are not charity. They're not even something reluctantly handed over in order to get work out of people. They're investments. Of course it requires you to find the right people, and doesn't eliminate any of the challenge or risk out of running a business, but no employer worth a squirt of piss is going to expect their employees to take those risks for the company. Protection from that kind of thing is why people work for companies and aren't just self-employed!