Reminder that states have been pushing children (not just teens) onto the factory and food processing floors for several years now because—oh what was the precipitating event. I can’t quite recall. Something that happened around 2020… Anyway, here’s a thread of articles. - ThreadSky

alyssaharad.bsky.social • 5 days ago

Reminder that states have been pushing children (not just teens) onto the factory and food processing floors for several years now because—oh what was the precipitating event. I can’t quite recall. Something that happened around 2020… Anyway, here’s a thread of articles.

Reposted from Jess Calarco

This is where we're headed. Deporting migrant workers and filling their jobs with teenagers who might as well work long hours and stop caring about school, because even if they want to go to college, they'll have no way of getting the aid they need to attend.
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Comments

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

From May of 2023, a round up of the fourteen states pushing to roll back child labor laws. https://www.epi.org/blog/iowa-governor-signs-one-of-the-most-dangerous-rollbacks-of-child-labor-laws-in-the-country-14-states-have-now-introduced-bills-putting-children-at-risk/

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

And from May of 2024, children continuing to work at an Iowa processing plant after headlines and legal proceedings re: the death of one such teen. https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/05/21/food/mar-jac-plant-poultry-death

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

Children and teens have always worked in the harvest fields. Adult laborers were particularly hard hit by Covid deaths and Long Covid. Now there are more. https://nfwm.org/farm-workers/farm-worker-issues/children-in-the-fields/

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

A less obvious, but still relevant version: trauma, horrific management practices and continued lack of mitigations have decimated the medical labor force. Here’s a program that’s recruiting teens. (🎁 link) https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/17/us/boston-schools-jobs-hospitals-bloomberg.html

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

From July 2023, teen worker deaths In Mississippi, Missouri and Wisconsin as states push to undo child labor laws. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/teen-poultry-factory-child-worker-deaths_n_64b7ecbce4b0ad7b75f67af7/amp

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

I swear I remember a twelve year old injured on the factory floor from a similar time period but cannot find it. Let me know if you remember too.

pyrholidon.bsky.social•5 days ago

Meanwhile, I can’t work in a hospital even if I wanted to because I was an idiot once 25 years ago.

crosis101.bsky.social•5 days ago

If only I grew up in Chicago and was forced to read The Jungle my entire childhood….

hobogue.bsky.social•5 days ago

Killing the Dept. of Education has, for these hypocritical bastards, a great upside -- kids don't need to go to school, hell, some of them would rather work 10 hrs a day!

emeraldjaguar.bsky.social•5 days ago

Pushing children to work in factories for several years?

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

If you read the thread I am obviously aware of the long history of child labor.

mrstrellisofnwales.bsky.social•5 days ago

Maybe it’s about time that European tourists stopped visiting Florida.

deadling.bsky.social•5 days ago

Back in the 60s, I guess it was normal for kids to be working, picking berries, and in a cannery. My mom said she hated it.

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

There’s always been a blurry line for child labor in ag-work with rules about it being temporary, for the summer, etc. I have friends who went to work at the fisheries in Alaska in the 1980s to earn college money. But that laxness made the current exploitation easier. :(

matthewcbryant.bsky.social•5 days ago

I was kinda recruited every year from 89 - 95 (aged 15-21) to go work in Alaska. Canneries, as I recall

deadling.bsky.social•5 days ago

My buddy did that at 19 to earn money on a fishing boat. He got fired and left at Ketchikan. And they didn't pay him for the time he did work. Had to get help to get home to OR.

alyssaharad.bsky.social•5 days ago

Ugh, awful. I was in Idaho at that age and would guess this was common throughout the Northwest, just as temp workers for fall harvests are in the Northeast.

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