Child Labor: the Stolen Innocence and Lost Education of Youth

Imagine being a child restricted from education confined in one area all day either in a dark room or outside in the hot sun with no skin protection unable to live the life a child should with laughs and friends and giggles. Child labor is one of the biggest issue around the world, putting children in danger and also it deprives them from an education. It is a worldwide and is often hidden or invisible especially in agriculture and big industries.

Child labor has been an international and also serious social problem for years child labor is a form of child abuse, it being the exploitation of children rights and freedoms.Underaged children are employed having more children working for them is a benefit because they pay them less for the more work they do as a result children are forced to work unreasonable amount hours of the day with no food water or break kids become very low nurtured and could possibly kill them. Child Labor began after the civil war, but can still be found today in foreign countries such as sub-Saharan, Africa ,South Asia and Latin America. Even though the first laws were passed in 1918 and 1922 owners are found with underage exploited children. Child labor has come a long way in the United States and the rest of the developing world over the last century. The inadequacies of child labor legislation has long been chronicled in poetry and literature, with Charles Dickens as an advocate against child exploitation in the workplace. The US has passed several federal laws, including the Fair Labor Standards Act, to improve the standards of work for children and all workers. Many states have also passed their own laws, which further improve standards. These laws mandate that children be a certain age before they are allowed to work, and that they work in safe conditions, for reasonable amounts of time, and for fair pay. This considered, I believe that child labor laws in the United States have advanced to a satisfactory level, and currently are in need of no further changes or additions

People believe that child labor does not affect them, not realizing that the Persian rugs they put their feet on are made by suffering children in a dark, small room. They don’t realize the soccer balls that their children are kicking around outside are made by children themselves, who slave away for little or no pay at all. In 1999, approximately 250 million children are employed or enslaved across the world. States can have stricter child labor laws than the federal law, but the federal child labor laws hold in the absence of stricter state laws. Federal child labor provisions covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) are summarized in Appendix 1. In the United States, FLSA gives the Department of Labor authority to prohibit minors under age 18 from working in occupations deemed too hazardous. children under the age of 18 are limited to work a maximum of three hours per day and eight hours per week during weeks that school is in session, and no more than forty hours per week during school vacations. Children under the age of 14 are prohibited from working except for agricultural employment, working for a family business, or performing “freelance work” such as babysitting or delivering newspapers. Child labor in agriculture is much less regulated. Regardless of age, children may be employed in any non-hazardous farm job without any restriction on number of hours during the school year. Children younger than age 14 may work only on their parents’ farm or on another farm with the written consent of their parents. Children who are 14 or older may work on farms without parental consent. By age 16, youths are no longer subject to protective restrictions on agricultural jobs which are regarded as hazardous.

Although there are efforts to put an end to child labour in the world of today, they do not seem to be enough. This is because even though there is a decrease in the number of children that experience child labor, the change is not significant. The level of child labor continues to increase. There are numerous causes of child labor like repression of child rights, poverty, improper education, limited rules and laws on child labor. The reasons for the child labor are almost the same in different nations. Poverty is the foremost cause of child labor around the world. The high level of unemployment and the problem of poverty in developing countries are the primary cause of child labor. As per the statistics of U.N. in the year 2005, over 1/4th of the people globally are living below the poverty line. The lack of right to regular education is one of the reasons for child labor in numerous nations. According to the research done in the year, 2006, nearly 76 million kids have not seen the face of the school. Children may have the experience of doing labor because their raised up and accustom to seeing it. . It may seem right for parents to involve their children in this nature for the sake of their family’s welfare. However, the right of that child for education and normal childhood is denied in the process. Presumably, in the societies where child labor is the way of life, only few individuals have the courage to speak against it. Unfortunately, their voices are unheard, there are efforts to lessen the number of child labors , but culture always gets in the way. This results in children working under very poor conditions that pose a danger to their health on short-term and long-term scale.

In conclusion, child labor is a major problem in the world. Many children lose their childhood because of it there are a lot of factors that you should be taken into consideration before laboring children.. Factors like, money, education, health and conditions. Children should have the chance to be a children. They should spend time playing and learning not wasting away their youth in hazardous factories. Every child has the right to have basic human needs, such as a healthy environment, shelter, nutrition, clean water, proper education and clothes. According to Unicef, a possible solution would be: ‘’One of the keys would be ensuring that all children go to school and that their education is of good quality”.

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