Lawmakers, mostly Republicans, argue that relaxing child labor laws could ease nationwide labor shortages.
“The consequences could be catastrophic,” said Reid Maki, director of the Child Labor Coalition, which campaigns against exploitative policies. “You can’t make up for a perceived shortage of workers at the expense of young workers.”
Over the past two years, lawmakers in at least 10 states have proposed relaxing child employment regulations, according to a report released last month by the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning group. Some proposals became law, while others were withdrawn or vetoed.
Lawmakers in Wisconsin, Ohio and Iowa are considering relaxing laws to address labor shortages. Employers struggled to fill vacancies after soaring retirements, deaths and illnesses from COVID-19, a drop in legal immigration and other factors.
Wisconsin lawmakers are backing a proposal that would allow 14-year-olds to serve alcohol in bars and restaurants. According to the National Institute on Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, if approved, Wisconsin could have the lowest minimum in this category in the country.
The Ohio Congress is about to pass legislation that would allow 14- and 15-year-old students to work until 9:00 p.m. during the school year with parental permission. It’s later than federal law allows, so a side measure is asking the US Congress to change its rules.
Under the Fair Employment Standards Act, minors may only work until 7pm during the school year. Congress passed this law in 1938 to prevent children from being exposed to unsafe conditions and abusive practices in mines, factories, farms, and street stores.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a Republican, signed legislation in March that eliminates the requirement for employers to verify the age and parental consent of a minor. Without this requirement, companies caught violating child labor laws can more easily plead ignorance. Additional measures to relax child labor laws were passed in New Jersey, New Hampshire and Iowa.
Republican Kim Reynolds, Gov. of Iowa, signed legislation last year allowing 16- and 17-year-olds to work unsupervised in preschools. The state legislature this month passed a rule that would allow young people of this age to serve alcohol in restaurants. It would also extend working hours for minors. Reynolds, who said in April she supports young people working more, has until June 3 to agree or veto the measure.
Republicans removed provisions from an earlier version of the rule that allowed 14- and 15-year-olds to work in hazardous fields like mining, logging and meat processing. However, it retained some parts that the Labor Department said violate federal laws, such as one that allows children as young as 14 to work in cold storage rooms and another that extends working hours in industrial laundries and assembly lines.
According to Maki of the Child Labor Coalition, a Washington-based activist network, youth workers are more likely to accept low wages and are less likely to form unions for better working conditions.
“There are employers who benefit from having reasonably docile youth workers,” Maki said. Youth, he added, are easy targets for industries that rely on vulnerable populations, such as immigrants and ex-convicts, to fill dangerous jobs.
The Department of Labor reported in February that child labor violations had increased nearly 70% since 2018. The agency has expanded its inspections and asked Congress to allow increases in fines for violators.
In February, the department fined one of the largest meat-processing plant cleaners $1.5 million after it found that the company was illegally employing more than 100 children in eight different states. Child laborers cleaned bone saws and other hazardous equipment in meat processing plants, often using hazardous chemicals.
National business lobbyists, chambers of commerce and well-funded conservative groups are backing state legislation to increase youth labor force participation. Such is the case with Americans for Prosperity, a conservative political network, and the National Federation of Independent Business, which tends to be close to Republicans.
According to the Washington Post, the conservative group Opportunity Solutions Project and its parent organization, the Florida think tank Foundation for Government Accountability, have helped lawmakers in Arkansas and Missouri draft child labor protection bills. Like-minded groups and lawmakers often say their efforts are aimed at strengthening parental rights and giving young people more work experience.
“There’s no reason anyone needs a state permit to have a job,” Arkansas Republican Representative Rebeca Burkes, who introduced the underage work permit bill, told the House of Representatives. “This is just an attempt to cut through the bureaucracy required and take away from parents the ability to decide whether their child can work.”
Margaret Wurth, child rights researcher for Human Rights Watch, a member of the Child Labor Coalition, described regulations like the one passed in Arkansas as “attempts to undermine essential and safe workplace safeguards and weaken the power of workers.”
Current laws do not protect many child laborers, Wurth said.
She wants the legislature to abolish the exceptions for child labor in agriculture. Federal law allows children as young as 12 to work on farms at any time outside of school hours, with parental permission. Agricultural workers as young as 16 may work at dangerous heights or operate heavy machinery—risky jobs reserved for adult workers in other industries.
According to the Bureau of Employment Statistics, 24 children died from work-related accidents in the United States in 2021. According to a report by the Government Accountability Office on fatal accidents in children between 2003 and 2016, about half of fatal workplace accidents occurred on farms.
“More children die working in agriculture than in any other sector,” Wurth said. “Monitoring will not do much to help farm workers’ children unless standards are improved.”
___
Harm Venhuizen is part of the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a national nonprofit program that places journalists in local newsrooms to cover underreported issues.
SPRING: Associated Press