Child labour laws across the US are being watered down in nearly a dozen states and eroding protections that have been in place for decades.
With labour in short supply – unemployment is at its lowest level since 1969 – desperate employers are looking for teenagers to fill the gap.
But that means scrapping long-standing child protection laws, many of which date back to the 1930s.
The move is dividing political opinion, with business groups supporting the changes while labour unions and Democrats oppose them.
“We build better communities and workplaces by enforcing high safety standards and family-sustaining wages – not by employing children,” Liz Shuler, president of the AFL-CIO federation of unions, told The National.
“Children, wherever they were born, belong in the classroom, not on the shop floor.”
The move comes as the US Department of Labour is reporting a sharp rise in the number of employers being prosecuted for hiring under-age staff. The latest figures collated by the department show a 37 per cent increase in the number of children found to be working illegally.
“We see every day the scourge of child labour in this country, and we have a legal and a moral obligation to take every step in our power to prevent it,” Labour Secretary Marty Walsh said in a statement this year.
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