Child Labor

Abstract

Children work all over the world, in rich countries as well as in poor countries. They do chores for their families, and many go out to fields and factories to earn modest amounts of money. Children are more likely to work if their families are poor. Children’s work can be an important part of their education, and it can make an important contribution to their own and their families’ sustenance. There can be no quarrel with that. The concern here, however, is with child labor. Child labor can be defined as children’s working in conditions that are excessively abusive and exploitative. It is not clear where exactly the boundary line between acceptable children’s work and unacceptable child labor should be located, but there are many situations in which there can be no doubt that the line has been crossed. A study prepared for the United Nations provided numerous illustrations:

Thousands of girls between the ages of 12 and 15 work in the small industrial enterprises at Kao-hsiung in southern Taiwan. … Some children [in Colombia] are employed 280 metres underground in mines at the bottom of shafts and in tunnels excavated in the rock. … Most carpet-makers [in Morocco] employ children between the ages of 8 and 12, who often work as many as 72 hours a week. … [In Pakistan] slave traffickers buy children for 1600 rupees from abductors. They cripple or blind the weakest, whom they sell to beggar masters. … one million Mexican children are employed as seasonal workers in the United States.¹