Telegram - Serving Metropolitan Detroit Since 1944

The United States has a child labor problem and it’s increasingly growing. Recent reports show that there has been an increase in child labor violations, it’s growing at an alarming rate in Michigan and other parts of the country. Many people in the state of Michigan and across the United States are unaware of this. However, there are plenty of those who are fully aware of this issue and are allowing it to happen. Companies are complicit in this practice. Children are being exploited in factories, auto plants, meat packing facilities, and many other places. As a result, children are sustaining life-threatening injuries.

Amid this crisis, lawmakers are pushing to loosen child labor laws in several different states. There have been Republican-led bills in states like Wisconsin, Iowa, Arkansas, and Ohio to help employers with the worker shortage and fill the spots of empty jobs by making it easier for minors to work in more jobs for longer shifts in a day. Two Wisconsin Republican lawmakers, state Sen. Rob Stafsholt, of New Richmond and state Rep. Chanz Green, of Grandview, is trying to pass a bill that would allow minors as young as 14-years-old to serve alcohol in bars and restaurants. As of today, it’s illegal for anyone under the age of 18-years-old to serve alcohol in the state of Wisconsin. These Republican-led bills don’t take into account the safety of the children.

An investigation by the New York Times revealed children were working overnight shifts at food processing giant Hearthside Food Solutions in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the state was unaware. Plenty of these children were undocumented immigrants. In the state of Michigan, like many other states it isn’t often tracked the places where minors are working and for how long they are working. Minors have to have a work permit to work in the state of Michigan. The school district where the minor lives has to sign off on the permit but it isn’t sent anywhere. Michigan Congress Dan Kildee, Congresswoman Hillary Scholten of Michigan, and House colleagues announce they’ve created a Child Labor Prevention Task Force. “It’s a fact of life and it’s one that we have to address. That’s why we’re announcing the Child Labor Prevention Task Force. It’s something Congresswoman Scholten and I concluded we needed to form. We have great allies in Congress who’ve been working on this issue or joining us as well. It’s the first of its kind and we intend to urgently address the root cause of child labor issues in this country.” said Kildee. This task force is created to hold corporations accountable and combat the child labor crisis in America.