Of course.
They're little shavers.
Kids should be allowed to work in sawmills. It build character and teaches them to pay attention.
- Johnny "Stumpy" Harrison
Of course.
They're little shavers.
Well if we rid ourselves of child labor laws then maybe wal-mart will build a few factories here.
I'll be damned before I ever haul hay again.
They have machines for it now, but BACK IN THE DAY... ;-)
The broader question is, are our national child labor laws benevolent or destructive?
I don't think we want to see little kids working in sweat shops 18 hours a day. But the idea that kids can't work at all is crazy. Why is it better to hang around getting into trouble than doing a few hours honest work every day?
Most of my kids have worked when they got old enough, and it has always been a positive experience for them. Play time is important too, but after kids pass a certain age they need to have something to do and some sense of what it means to earn your own money.
I have always thought that in eighth grade one should have the option of ending and go on to work. There are a lot of children who neeed to get on with their lives and will work and perhaps eventually go to night school/
My son had severe reading disabilities. So instead of pushing for college, I apprenticed him to an auto mechanic at age 14. Yes, a mechanics shop is a dangerous place but I had confidence in the owner.
My son spent the first year working part time as a tool "gopher" and couldn't wait to start doing brakes and such - the first jobs he was allowed to do. He started collecting his own tools at that age too. I remember the day he came home with his first $5 tip at age 15. He was thrilled.
He sat for and passed his ASE exams at age 18. (You are not allowed to take the exam without 2 years full time experience). At 20 he is an auto technician and the main mechanic in a private shop. He LOVES what he does. He has continued his auto education, taking seminars and getting certificates.
It's probably the best thing I ever did for him. But I hate to think of what could have happened if some liberal schoolteacher had spotted him out and reported us. They could have squashed the dream, all in the name of nanny state protection.
I had to get up in the morning, at ten o'clock at night, half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulfuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill and pay millowner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our mum and dad would kill us and dance about on our graves, singing Hallelujah!
If you bought Nike sneakers, you support child labor. If you shop at Wal*mart, you support Child Labor. Corporations do not care who makes their products as long as their money keeps rolling in.
Child labor isn't all that bad.
The kids stay off the street and make their own cash to spend.
A child spending his/her own cash has more respect for the item they purchase than one spending Ma and Pa's money.