Teen Killed in Sawmill Accident as Child Labor Law Violations Grow

Updated July 17, 2023, 11:30 PST

• While lawmakers want to eliminate child labor laws, a 16-year-old died in an industrial accident while working in a sawmill in Wisconsin earlier this month. A cause of death has not been released, but the incident points to the growing trend of child labor law violations across the country.
• Statistics from the Department of Labor reveal that the number of minors employed in violation of labor laws was up 37% in 2022 over the previous year.
• Observers and activists point to the small fines that companies receive when they violate child labor laws as being an insufficient deterrent. A food sanitation company was fined just $1.5 million for employing over 100 children to clean meat-cutting equipment with toxic chemicals earlier this year.

What's the story?

• State lawmakers are passing laws that allow more minors to work in low-paying and dangerous jobs.
• In 2022, the Department of Labor reported a 37% increase in the number of minors working in violation of child labor laws compared to the previous year. This number has gone up by 283% since 2015.
• This increase is driven by several factors: employers seeking cheap labor, a large influx of unaccompanied minors entering the country, instances of human trafficking, and state legislatures relaxing child-labor laws to accommodate industry demands.
• Some Republicans argue that the weakening of laws is a response to a competitive labor market and the challenges businesses face in hiring workers.

Child labor laws

• The federal government established the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) in 1938 to regulate youth employment. The FLSA prohibits harmful child labor and sets minimum standards for wages and working hours for teenage workers. Most minors are protected by the FLSA, however, states are making efforts to reduce their own protective measures.
• In the past two years, at least 14 states have weakened child-labor protections. These new laws often increase work hours, remove restrictions on hazardous jobs, lower the age for serving alcohol at tables, or introduce lower wages for minors.
• In Iowa, new laws permit children as young as 14 to work in industrial laundries. With approval, 16-year-olds can also work in hazardous occupations like roofing, excavation, demolition, and operating power-driven machinery.
• Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas recently signed a law that removes the need for 14- and 15-year-olds to get parental consent and a state permit before starting work.

What's being done? 

• Following a New York Times investigation, the Biden administration announced plans to strengthen measures against child labor and better enforce existing laws.
• The Department of Labor and Health and Human Services will create a combined task force to investigate companies hiring underage migrant workers and to improve the screening of sponsors for unaccompanied children.

Do you support stronger child labor laws?

—Laura Woods & Emma Kansiz 

(Photo credit: Pix4Free)