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I would imagine that the deal with Ohio requires that children working in Amish lumber operations are required to obey all state saftey orders, especially in regard to children. While a church may be exempt from child labor laws for religious reasons, a church is not exempt from Safety Laws, as no legitimate religious purpose can be argued in allowing a church to ignore orders and laws set up for the protection of paid workers or children. Thus I would imagine that children working in Amish factories and construction sites are required to be subject to all saftey rules and orders that apply to non-Amish, i.e., safety harnesses on roofing jobs, eye protection, ear protection, point of operation protection, hard hats, safety shoes.

Now with regard to the man in the article, it appears that he is not exactly the paragon of virtue. He is a scofflaw. He apparently not only was in violation of safety laws, but fraud as well.

"He has been audited five times since 1990 for such violations as failing to have industrial insurance and inaccurately reporting employees' hours. He was fined $107,000 for erroneously reporting hours for workers-compensation insurance and $4,400 for violating state health-and-safety laws."

That's downright dishonest. In California you could go to jail for that.

" In California you could go to jail for that."

Not entirely true, i've always made my employees adhear to safety laws but I flat won't obay them personally and have told OSHA inspectors to take a flying leap at a rolling donut since as an owner they can't touch me for endangering my own live. I've dared them to cite me and the won't do it since they know they would lose, especially since i've exempted myself from comp insurance my entire life.

I don't know the details about the Amish exemption from child labor laws, but I do know they exist. I would imagine that they have to follow reasonable safety rules, but I think they'd be different because their equipment is different.

The Amish have their exemption based upon known, long-standing religio-cultural traditions.

I doubt the man above can claim such a thing.