metal packer in a junkyard, followed by other jobs as a truck driver, gas station attendant, rodman, apprentice electrician, and finally as a draftsman with Hawaii's Department of Transportation. When a job posting for promotion in the department was announced, he took the exams for the promotion and topped it with a grade point of 99.9%. Cayetano lost the promotion to a Japanese American, despite his outstanding intellectual achievement. Later Cayetano found out that the interviewer was of the same ethnic background as the person that he lost the job to. A growing Family and this incident, which Cayetano calls "Asian vs. Asian" discrimination and a series of dead-end jobs was the turning point in the life of the young family. In 1963, following a suggestion of a friend that he could earn a college degree in Los Angeles, California while working by attending night school, he and his wife Lorraine moved to California with their two young children. This was a big step for a family that has never even visited any of the other Hawaiian Islands. In Los Angeles, Cayetano worked as a draftsman for two years. At night he was attending school at Harbor College. His wife Lorraine took a job as a waitress at the Los Angeles International Airport to help support the family. Cayetano earned excellent grades at Harbor College, which enabled him to transfer to the University of California at Los Angeles. In 1968, Benjamin Cayetano graduated with Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and a minor in American History. After Graduation, he continued school to study law at Loyola Law School. In 1971, eight years after moving to Los Angeles, he earned a Bachelor of Laws degree from Loyola Law School. Immediately after law school, Cayetano and his family returned to Hawaii, where he started to practice law and joined the Democratic Party.In 1972, his role model, hero, and then Governor of Hawaii, Jack Burns, appointed him to the State Housing A...
