Child Labor Laws In America

Child labor has been going on for quite some time. Many people that you ask that grew up in the 1900s will tell you the story about working on a farm. Many of these people only went to school until the 6th or 7th grade due to the family needing their help on the farm or different business. We used to see this happen all of the time, but today the United States has child labor laws that require children to go to school up until a certain age. This may be the case for the United States, but not for many other countries or regions around the world. We may not see or hear of the children being injured or dying every day, but it is happening. Child labor has always existed. When children have become old enough to work or help out with the family
Dating back to 1832, the amount of time children were allowed to work in factories was reduced due to the New England Association of Farmers, and other workingmen acknowledging the endangerment of health and well-being (Child labor timeline). The first laws were passed in 1836 when Massachusetts passed a law requiring children to go to school for at least 3 months out of the year (Child labor timeline). The next big event that is important occurred in 1997 when congress passed the Sanders-Harkin Indentured Child Labor Import Ban that prohibited the U.S. Many laws have been passed over the years to regulate issues with child labor. It is no lie that children are working in unsafe conditions all over the world, even in the United States. One example was found in an article about a young 18 year old that was killed in an accident while working in the logging business. The article addresses the laws that Washington has regarding age requirements for hazardous
We need to make sure that we are getting children through school and allowing them to make their own decisions after school instead of throwing them right into work at the age of 12. This issue is still a concern in America, but not as much as it used to be because of all of the laws that we now have put into place. It is a big concern around the world though, especially in poor countries. I can see distributive justice in child labor. “Distributive justice addresses the allocation of resources such as wealth, power, and reward” (Cannon, 36). I see a problem of us consumers continuing to consume these products that are made possible by putting children to work. The companies in between are the ones making all of the money, the children are making a couple dollars a day and we the goods are being sold for way more than that. We can make things right with these children by giving them safe working conditions and paying a little better. For example, we are all consumers of goods such as cell phones. Children are working in unsafe conditions in order to get what is needed to produce cell phones. We can do them a justice by solving the problem and finding a more efficient and safe way to produce the