While homeowners are shifting properties and energy companies are posting record profits, there's another economic story playing out at the bottom of the pay scale — and it's not what the headline numbers suggest.

New Zealand's youngest workers — those aged 15 to 19 — collectively earned $37.8 million in 2024, according to Stats NZ data. That's 54% more than the $24.5 million they earned in 2019, before COVID upended everything. (Source: Stats NZ (LEED), earnings-by-industry)

Sounds like good news for teenagers starting their first jobs, right? Here's the problem: inflation over that same period has run at roughly 20-25%. Which means in real terms — what those dollars actually buy at the supermarket or the petrol station — young workers are barely keeping pace with where they were five years ago.

The trajectory tells the story of the pandemic economy in miniature. Earnings for this age group held steady through 2020 and 2021 at around $26.5 million. Then came the labour shortage of 2022, and suddenly those numbers jumped — $31.7 million that year, then $36.3 million in 2023, finally hitting $37.8 million in 2024.

Employers desperate for staff were paying more. But so was everyone else. Food prices surged. Rent climbed. Power bills — well, Contact Energy's 44% profit jump tells you how that story went.

For a 17-year-old working weekend shifts at a café or stacking shelves after school, that 54% increase in aggregate earnings doesn't translate to 54% more purchasing power. It translates to barely treading water while adults around them debate whether the economy is recovering.

This matters because this age group is where most Kiwis learn the relationship between work and money. They're learning that relationship right now, in an economy where nominal wage growth looks impressive on paper but feels hollow in practice. Where a pay rise sounds good until you're standing at the checkout.

The data shows young workers are earning more than ever before in dollar terms. What it doesn't show — but what every teenager with a bank account knows — is that "more than ever" doesn't mean what it used to.