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I don't think child labor laws are contributing to a lack of skilled labor since child labor is almost entirely unskilled. Picking beans, delivering newspapers and sweeping floors aren't the skills lacking from today's workforce. I'd be concerned with predatory relationships with younger workers as well who have less social skills and experience in standing up for themselves and their legal rights as workers.

Given the current labor situation, I can't fathom any reason to relax restrictions on child labor other than appeasing business owners who want someone to sweep the floors and take out the trash for $5.25/hr rather than paying an unemployed adult.

I'm not intrinsically against kids working; my older son has worked for a couple years with his grandmother on some weekends helping set up events linen. But he makes good money for it and I obviously don't have to worry about him being mistreated.

At least until the robot ones are completed.

On second thought, I could probably get some kid to do my job. Pay them five bucks an hour, keep collecting my check. I can do something else during the day - maybe to work in a theater and watch movies for free.

There's no way in hell this is about anything other than businesses lobbying the government for more cheap labor (with no required benefits). Totally against it for that reason alone. There are already hardship laws that allow kids in less than favorable conditions to work to support their family. A normal 12 year old has no business holding a job (aside from the stereotypical paper / food delivery via bike), certainly not during the school week, and certainly not for the sole gain of the employer, who would most certainly abuse the lack of social development in the child to their benefit..

I could see allowing some narrowly defined exceptions, but in most cases a kid should be a kid, why take that away from them? Things like Child actors where the kid is going to make more money than I will in my entire carreer? Sure. Paper / food delivery, seasonal fruit picking, lemonade stands and car washes? why not. Parents own a bakery and they want to pay you part time to help decorate baked goods or something? I'm ok with that. But it would have to be a carefully thought out series of circumstances that start with the premise "hey, this kid wants to do this because they find it fun or interesting, and are not being forced into it in any way"

I could see the whole thing being abused really easily though too.

So now we need child labor to make up for our imaginary lack in skilled labor they use as their excuse for outsourcing? Look how easy it is for them to sugar coat these things and make people think it's even remotely acceptable.

Disgusting. My son is 12. I would never allow him to get a job at his age. Mow a few lawns, deliver some papers, sure those things will teach him a bit of responsibility, an hourly job he needs to be at between X and Y on a given night/weekend? Hell no. He's a kid, he should be doing homework, chores (again, learning responsibility), or playing. Also, why is a 12 year old's mopped floor cheaper than a 16 year olds?

Laws vary state by state but, yes, family business are generally exempt (more or less) from child labor laws. It's not absolute -- I assume you can't have your five year old working a foundry -- but it's much more lax than for other scenarios.

Small Government, No regulation.

FREEDOM!

Surely even someone as obtuse as you can see where this leads...





Yeah, and one really big one. See above. It's nonsense to suggest that such a system is feasible, but then again, you've never been to let nonsense stand in your way.

Yeah. That's precisely what I was thinking of. Depends on how steep the difference is though and whether the position in question is one you'd rather trust to someone older and presumably more capable. My point really was more about the problems inherent with the very idea of having a minimum wage in the first place, not necessarily what the perfect solution would be. If you've already accepted the fact that a minimum wage should exist, you are already accepting the idea of a wage being defined by what is needed by the worker and not how valuable the labor is to the employer. That concept already skews things IMO.

You basically have the problem where if the minimum applies to everyone then you're paying a higher wage to those who don't need it, which breaks the assumed case for having the minimum wage in the first place. But if you have a different minimum for adults versus teens, then you run into the very problem you just outlined. Again though, the flip side is that teens can't get jobs if the minimum wage is set too high because their labor is going to be that much more significantly less valuable than the minimum. You can theoretically minimum wage yourself out of a workforce if you're not careful. Therefore you can't raise minimum wage up sufficiently to really accomplish the presumed objective of having it in the first place.


I'd say that my solution is to just scrap the idea of having a minimum wage in the first place and let the older/better workers make more than the younger and less experienced ones naturally because their labor is actually worth more to the employer. But that would just be crazy talk, right? So *if* we have a minimum wage at all, we need to ask ourselves why it exists and what it's for. If it's to ensure that those supporting themselves and/or a family can always make enough to do that, then we need to not apply that to people who aren't doing that (and thus don't need that wage). How we do that can vary. Currently, we place extreme restrictions on teens working. But if we're even considering reducing or removing those restrictions, then we need to look at how to deal with minimum wage issues as well.

Not doing so would be a mistake IMO. And no, there is no ideal solution. Some are just better than others.

Edited, Dec 3rd 2013 4:55pm by gbaji

If the hotel down the street does this and you don't, they'll have responsible adults running their shifts, and you'll have a bunch of teenagers goofing off. Guess which one will regret that choice?

The free market does actually work if you give it a chance.

Unless, you know, that hotel down the block didn't hire every "responsible adult" in the local labor market.

Works fantastic for the business owner, sure. Ah, to remember the heady days of the 1920's when a responsible adult would be hired for a solid wage over a seven year old boy down at the garment factory...

Edited, Dec 3rd 2013 7:40pm by Jophiel