I doubt it. Do you get discounted/free food? Do you make your paycheck in tips? (meaning paycheck*2, meaning out here, that'd be ~$12-13 an hour)
Sure, you work harder, but you make more $ too. I'd rather be occupied with doing something than sitting there and going "ok, you can go...... wait..... ok, you can go" for six hours at a time.
I get dramatically discounted food. A 22oz soda is $1, down from $2.25. A $2 icecream bar is $1. In our break room, we get king sized candy bars for decent prices (the entire vending machine is >$1). No, I don't get tips, but the friend in question works at Wendy's, not a, in your words, real resteraunt, so he doesn't either. I'm sure there are people my age who make more than me, but the fact is I'm content with what I do make.
Story of the day! Clocking out I realized that a new pay cycle had begun, and I'd clocked out yesterday with 13.99 hours (not 13 hours and 99 minutes, though), all acheived on a Friday-Saturday. Today I got to run the most "intense" slide we have, the Hurricane, and naturally on my first shift running it the raft-return went to shit on us. Luckily the shallow-guard at the bottom was Tory and he knew I was a newbie and figured it all out on his own.
. After that it was shallow-guard in the kiddie pool for two rotations in a row (the person behind me was willing to skip me, but thought I was insane), and then clocking out 15 minutes late because LG supervisors can't tell time. When I went to schedule my hours for this week, the supervisor in that area was on Yahoo chatting and had to finish typing her message before she minimized and talked to me.
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EDIT -
At Newby's second point, slide attendants only attend slides half the time. The rest is shallow-guarding in kiddie pools. You don't need certification to do shallow-guard under 1ft, but you can't administer first aid if something happens (two whistle blows and a "come here" sign gets you a real lifeguard though so it's all good, and three whistle blows gets them all!).
