Child labor in the United States

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1 History
2 Federal and State Child Labor Laws
3 External links
4 References

History

During the Industrial Revolution, children sometimes as young as 7 were often made to work for 14 hours a day, and under conditions that are currently prohibited for people of any age. The government was under a lot of pressure to control this. The first child labor laws in the U.S. were passed. Soon afterward, laws were passed which controlled work conditions and hours for those of all ages. However, even after the abusive child labor "epidemic" was clearly over, the laws were not repealed. In fact, they have continued to become stricter over the years.

One of the major arguments often used to keep these laws in place is that allowing young people to get jobs takes jobs away from adults, thus increasing unemployment. However, a large part of the material in the laws cannot be accounted for this way, such as requiring parental consent for work permits to be granted. However, there are some activist groups which believe that these laws are good and should be implemented over the whole world.

On the contrary, some youth rights groups say that these laws deprive adolescents of the right to work, and call for the laws to be repealed or to have the restriction reduced. Some also say that allowing otherwise legal jobs for adolescents may reduce the number that become drug dealers or prostitutes. Some studies bear this out: for example, a UNICEF study found that that 5,000 to 7,000 Nepalese children turned to prostitution after the U.S. banned that country's carpet exports in the 1990s.

Federal and State Child Labor Laws

The federal child labor laws are part of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) of 1938, which also controls minimum wage. Some states have no unique child labor laws, and thus simply use the federal laws. Other states have stricter child labor laws of their own. In some states, almost all jobs are totally prohibited for persons under the age of 16.