Child Labor Today

Child Labor

Child labor is work that harms children or keeps them from attending school. Around the world and in the U. S., growing gaps between rich and poor in recent decades have forced millions of young children out of school and into work. The International Labor Organization estimates that 215 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 currently work under conditions that are considered illegitimate, hazardous, or extremely abusive. Underage children work at all sorts of jobs around the world, usually because they and their families are extremely poor. Large numbers of children work in commercial agriculture, fishing, manufacturing, mining, and domestic service. Some children work in illegal activities like the drug trade and prostitution or other traumatic activities such as serving as soldiers.

Forms of child labor, including indentured servitude and child slavery, have existed throughout American history. As industrialization moved workers from farms and home workshops into urban areas and factory work, children were often preferred, because factory owners viewed them as more manageable, cheaper, and less likely to strike. Growing opposition to child labor in the North caused many factories to move to the South. By 1900, states varied considerably in whether they had child labor standards and in their content and degree of enforcement. By then, American children worked in large numbers in mines, glass factories, textiles, agriculture, canneries, home industries, and as newsboys, messengers, bootblacks, and peddlers. 

Characteristics of Child Labor

• Violates a nation’s minimum age laws
• Threatens children’s physical, mental, or emotional well-being
• Involves unacceptable abuse, such as child slavery, child trafficking, forced labor, or illegal activities
• Prevents children from going to school
• The use of children to undermine labor standards

Child Labor Reform and the U.S. Labor Movement

• 1832 New England unions condemn child labor

The New England Association of Farmers, Mechanics and Other Workingmen resolve that “Children should not be allowed to labor in the factories from morning till night, without any time for healthy recreation and mental culture,” for it “endangers their . . . well-being and health”.

• 1836 Early trade unions propose state minimum age laws

Union members at the National Trades’ Union Convention make the first formal, public proposal recommending that states establish minimum ages for factory work.

• 1836 First state child labor law

Massachusetts requires children under 15 working in factories to attend school at least 3 months/year.

• 1842 States begin limiting children’s work days

Massachusetts limits children’s work days to 10 hours; other states soon pass similar laws—but most of these laws are not consistently enforced.

• 1876 Labor movement urges minimum age law

Working Men’s Party proposes banning the employment of children under the age of 14.

• 1881 Newly formed AFL supports state minimum age laws

The first national convention of the American Federation of Labor passes a resolution calling on states to ban children under 14 from all gainful employment.

• 1883 New York unions win state reform

Led by Samuel Gompers, the New York labor movement successfully sponsors legislation prohibiting cigar making in tenements, where thousands of young children work in the trade.

• 1892 Democrats adopt union recommendations

Democratic Party adopts platform plank based on union recommendations to ban factory employment for children under 15.

• 1904 National Child Labor Committee forms

Aggressive national campaign for federal child labor law reform begins.

• 1916 New federal law sanctions state violators

First federal child labor law prohibits movement of goods across state lines if the minimum age laws are violated (law in effect only until 1918, when it’s declared unconstitutional, then reviewed, passed, and declared unconstitutional again).

• 1924 First attempt to gain federal regulation fails

Congress passes a constitutional amendment giving the federal government authority to regulate child labor, but too few states approve and it never takes effect.

• 1936 Federal purchasing law passes

Walsh-Healey Act states U.S. government won't purchase goods made by underage children.

• 1937 Second attempt to gain federal regulation fails

Second attempt to approve constitutional amendment by giving federal government authority to regulate child labor falls just short of getting necessary votes.

• 1937 New federal law sanctions growers

Sugar Act makes sugar beet growers not allowed to from benefit payments if they violate state minimum age and hours of work standards.

• 1938 Federal regulation of child labor achieved in Fair Labor Standards Act

For the first time, minimum ages of employment and hours of work for children are regulated by federal law.

Child Labor in the world today

• Asia and the Pacific in fact still has the largest numbers (almost 78 million) but Sub-Saharan Africa continues to be the region with the highest occurrence of child labor (59 million) that's over 21%.
• There are 13 million of children in child labor in Latin America and the Caribbean and in the Middle East and North Africa there are 9.2 million that's about 8.4%.

• Child labor in India makes up 3.6% of the country’s total work force.
• In Bangladesh the number is 30.1%.
• China child labor is at 11.6%.
• Pakistan it is 17.7%.
• Kenya it is 41.3%.

Sources:

• https://www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html

• http://laborawareness.wordpress.com/child-labor-today/