Not sure why last print is off? Please see comments for specific question
john = ['john doe', 44, 32000]
jane = ['jane doe', 23, 12000]
people = [john, jane]
for p in people:
#===========================================================================
# p[0] prints "john doe" as expected
# p[0].split() prints ['john', 'doe'] as expected
# p[0].split()[0] prints "john" and "jane" as expected
#===========================================================================
for x in p[0].split():
print('--> ', x[0])
# prints "j","d" - not sure why
# expected "john" and "jane"
you probably want to get rid of the subscript after ‘x’.