But Laban, seeing how Jehovah had blessed him because of Jacob, insisted that he continue overseeing his flocks; Jacob was even told to stipulate his own wages. In that part of the world the sheep and goats are generally of a solid color, the sheep being white, the goats black. Jacob therefore asked that only the sheep and goats with abnormal colors or markings be given to him​—all the sheep dark brown in color and all the goats with any white marks. “Why, that is fine!” was Laban’s reply. And to keep the wages as low as possible, Laban, at Jacob’s suggestion, separated out of the flocks all the striped, speckled, and color-patched goats and the dark-brown young male sheep, which he gave to his own sons to look after, even putting a three-day distance between them, to prevent any interbreeding of the two flocks. Only abnormally colored ones born in the future would be Jacob’s.​—Ge 30:25-36.

During the six years that Jacob worked under this arrangement, Jehovah greatly blessed and prospered him by increasing not only his flocks but also the number of his servants, camels, and asses, and this in spite of the fact that Laban kept changing the agreed-upon wages.