Child labor has a long history in the United States. In pre-industrial America, it was common for children to work on family farms, apprentice, or learn the family trade. The Industrial Revolution wildly changed what child labor looked like in the US. Instead of children working for and under the supervision of their families, they would instead be employed by massive corporations. No longer were children working for the betterment of their family, but now for the profit of others. The advent of advanced machines allowed relatively unskilled children to do the same job as fully grown adults leading to an explosion in the number of children working in factories and other industrial settings. The 1900 census found that 1 out of 5 children aged 10-15 were professionally employed. This trend was fueled by the fact that children were simply much cheaper to pay, which had obvious appeal to industrialists.
These rapid changes carried a stark human cost, however, with children employed in these industrial settings being subjugated to dangerous and toxic work environments. Children are generally more susceptible to the toxic environments of factories and are far more likely to suffer serious injury while operating factory machinery than adults. This led to children being far more likely to suffer serious harm at the workplace than a regular adult worker would. Children are also much easier to exploit than a regular adult would be. They are often willing to work longer hours for less payout of both naivety and sheer desperation. This is especially true for impoverished or migrant children. Industrialists would often specifically target the children of migrants, orphans, or children in poverty to take advantage of these groups’ desperate need for income.
By the 20th century, there was a glaring need for reform and regulation in the child labor force. Movements led by educational reformers built off the belief that kids should be in school, not work, set the basis for the first child labor restrictions passed in the US. Most of these bills were very vague however and left numerous loopholes that were readily exploited by corporations to maintain their young workforce. Reformes and lawmakers kept pushing and eventually in 1916 the first major policy restricting child labor was passed by Congress. The Keating-Owen Act is widely considered the first ever major child labor reform but it was deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. A second policy attempt in 1918 called the Child Labor Tax Law was passed but just like the last bill, it was deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. It wasn’t until 1938 that Congress would find real, permanent success in regulating child labor with the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The FLSA is a landmark bill for all labor regulation, especially that of child labor. It was the first major child labor reform ever and reversed the previous decisions of the Supreme Court on past bills regulating child labor.
Now in the 21st century, we see the time of dangerous child labor as the distant past, with the only reference to it being in history textbooks. However, a new and dangerous bill in the Florida House threatens to make the past not so distant. HB 49 is a bill that looks to loosen child labor regulations in Florida in numerous ways. First, it seeks to remove certain regulations on how many hours a minor aged 16-17 can work while school is in session. It also loosens the work curfew required for minors aged 16-17, allowing them to start work earlier and end later. It even has a provision that would allow 16 and 17-year-olds to work during school hours if they enrolled in a “home education program” or a “virtual instruction program”.
On the surface these changes seem rather benign but under closer scrutiny, they contain more than a few dangerous red flags. First, it is always important to consider that any policy passed on a certain subject opens the door for that bill’s effects to be taken further by future legislation (see the Don’t Say Gay bill). Minor deregulation of child labor can very easily turn into major deregulation in future years. Even looking past that harrowing notion, the present effects of HB 49 are not good either. Allowing children to work more while school is in session can potentially take a student’s attention away from their studies which should be the most important priority in the lives of children. It could also lead to increased burnout as children may overload themselves with work and school. “Home education programs” and “virtual instruction programs” are also very vague and can easily be used as loopholes to keep kids working instead of in school. HB 49 will also harm the adult labor force as more readily available cheaper child laborers will discourage businesses from hiring more adults. HB 49 will also likely have a disproportionate effect on children who come from more vulnerable socio-economic backgrounds. Children who come from families with less economic resources will be more likely to work as much as possible to provide for their families, taking attention away from their studies. This is an undesirable outcome as numerous studies have shown that furthering a child’s education is the single best way to rise in socio-economic standing. Discouraging academics and encouraging work will only perpetuate the impoverishment of already vulnerable children.
HB 49 is not only extremely concerning when considering modern contexts, but it becomes even more stomach-turning when you place it against the backdrop of history. Child labor regulation has been a long-fought battle in this country dating back to as early as the 19th century with the Industrial Revolution. Thousands of former reformers and lawmakers worked incredibly hard to provide sound arguments against the practice of child labor and were largely successful in creating meaningful policy change with the passing of the FLSA. HB 49 would create the first major backslide of child labor protections since the FLSA’s passing which would, frankly, be a disservice to the legacy and work done by our predecessors to protect children from exploitation.
HB 49 would also set the foundation for the return to a Gilded Age version of child labor. In the late 19th to early 20th century, before the FLSA was passed, disadvantaged children were most often the target of industrialists for cheap labor. Industrialists understood the desperation of migrant or impoverished children and would exploit this to ensure cheap labor in their factories. Impoverished and migrant children were often specific targets of this strategy. It does not take much imagination to see how HB 49 could cause this situation to be mirrored in the present day. Florida is home to a robust immigrant community and this bill could make their children vulnerable to corporate exploitation the same way they were in the 20th century. We have seen this pattern of exploitation before in the US and we should take steps to ensure it never happens again.
It is also important to remember that the same arguments used to oppose child labor in the 20th century still hold true today. Even with our limited understanding of a child’s physiology and the importance of these formative years, we still understood that widespread child labor was detrimental to a child’s development. Now we have a vast knowledge base of the crucial years of adolescence yet HB 49 seeks to revert protections for children in that time of their lives. As science moves forward, our laws should not move backward.
The fight against child labor has been a long-fought battle for generations. Many reformers and lawmakers have presented numerous arguments that turned into real policy changes to protect our nation’s children from economic exploitation. Their work is at risk of being undone. HB 49 could spark the beginning of an unraveling of child labor regulations that have existed for decades. The Florida legislature should be moving the state forward, not backward. Take time to honor the work of our predecessors and call on your local representatives to oppose HB 49 and maintain protections for our children.