america 2023 employers exploitation of white black and brown children

By: Kenneth A. Sprang, Esq

Shadows of the Jungle 

Over the course of our lives, many of us have journeyed through the pages of The Jungle, the well-known book by Upton Sinclair. Mr. Sinclair, through a work of fiction, exposed some of the horrors of working conditions in America at the time of his writing in the early 20th century. Although his focus was on the horrible working conditions in the meat packing industry, it raised more alarms about public health. The book focuses on a Lithuanian immigrant family and their travails, but it also notes the plight of working children.

When immigrant families came to America, children were often sent to work in order to help support the family--legally.  As industry grew following the Civil War, children, often as young as 10 years old but sometimes much younger, labored. They worked not only in industrial settings but also in retail stores, on the streets, on farms, and in home-based industries. In 1870 1 of every eight children was employed, while by 1900 1 in 5 children were employed.

The most visible of working children were the “newsies,” the newsboys who hawked the daily paper with fervor.  Their earnings were tied solely to the number of papers they sold. Other children worked in coal mines, cotton mills, factories, home-based industries and farms. At the time, children were seen essentially as the property of their father and their earnings belonged to their father. 

Child labor finally became an issue for the federal government with the passage of the Keating-Owen Act in 1916, which prohibited children under 16 from working between 7:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. and banned children under 16 from working more than 8 hours per day. The statute also banned children under age 14 from factories, workshops, and canneries and children under 16 from mines and quarries. The Supreme Court, however, found the act to be unconstitutional. Only when the labor market sharply contracted during the Great Depression — when adults nationwide could not secure employment and children had already been largely pushed out of the industrial workforce”  did attitudes begin to slowly change.

The Fair Labor Standards Act, adopted in 1938, provided the first federal restrictions on child labor. Today the Act allows children 16 or older to work almost anywhere, except in industries or situations which are hazardous, as defined in the regulations. Children between 14 and 16 are limited both in the number of hours they can work and the places they can work. The regulations are intended to prohibit students from working rather than attending school. Children working in agriculture are treated somewhat differently.

Until recently, Americans thought that child labor issues were simply relics of a bygone era. However, the Department of Labor in 2022 found children between the ages of 13 and 17 unlawfully working to clean a slaughterhouse in the Midwest at night. The work exposed them to dangerous equipment and caustic chemicals used in cleaning. Children who worked during the night were falling asleep in school.

Another DOL investigation found 10-year-old children working at McDonalds in Louisville sometimes until 2:00 a.m.

Soon thereafter, the State of Arkansas effectively rolled back key child labor protections by statute. Arkansas is just one of 10 states where bills have been enacted or introduced to lift a variety of restrictions on children’s employment. These changes often reduce ages at which children can work and eliminate restrictions on jobs long considered hazardous to children’s health and development, undercutting protections that have been in place at the federal level since Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938. 

As the labor market remains tight, it should come as no surprise that we are seeing increasing numbers of rollbacks of child labor protections as employers seek workers. Hiring children keeps wages low, and reflects pro-business, anti-regulation political rhetoric. Immigrant children are often easily exploited, among others.

It is important to remember that many states have their own regulations governing children in the workplace. If the state regulations are less protective than federal regulations, federal regulation 

Unfortunately, the penalty for violations of the federal law governing working children is only $11,000, so for a large enterprise the fine is no more than a nuisance. There are some additional penalties which may be imposed, but at the end of the day the penalties are pretty modest. Fortunately, there is now some movement in Congress to address the issue, including an attempt to raise the penalties for violations.

The issue is not yet improving; rather it is getting worse.