The Fair Labor Standards Act
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| Franklin D. Roosevelt Wikipedia |
The agriculture restrictions of the Fair Labor Standards Act are as follows.
· No limit on the number of hours worked.
· No overtime pay.
· Children are allowed to work much younger with little restriction on how many hours.
o At age 16 they are viewed as an adult. Capable of doing the same tasks.
o 14 & 15-year-old work hours cannot be during school hours. They are not allowed to do “hazardous” jobs.
o 12 & 13-year-old have the same restrictions as 14 & 15-year-olds with the addition that parents have either given permission or that they work in the same field as their parents (Fact Sheet 40).
Perhaps if we continue to view agriculture as being primarily family farm settings it would still make sense. Unfortunately, in eighty years things have changed family farms are disappearing. The majority of farm laborers are immigrants from other countries who work primarily on commercial farms. When compared to mining and factory work farming was not viewed as hazardous in 1938, however, today agriculture is the most hazardous job available to children (Neff). In a society where children spend the majority of their free time on screens, there are still children working long hours bent over harvesting crops. Migrant children are working alongside big machinery, they haul heavy bags and buckets, work with sharp tools, climb tall ladders and are exposed to pesticide (Neff).
A movement was started to change the child labor laws in agriculture but in 2012 it was discontinued despite reassurances that the implementations would not affect family farms (Peralta). Unfortunately, by protecting family farms the migrant workers continue to suffer from unfair employment low pay, long hours, and no benefits. On a family farm, the workload varies an almost pause between planting and harvesting that migrant families don’t experience.
Migrant families move from state to state following the various harvests. During the summer, migrant children work alongside their families from sun up to sun down seven days a week. Family farms are typically more cautious with what tasks they feel their children are capable of performing. More than likely, they will make certain no one is close to a field when it is being sprayed with pesticides. The end goal of a commercial field is profit; there is no inherent connection to a child’s wellbeing.
It is not the family farm that needs protection but the migrant workers.
Work Cited
“Fact Sheet 40: Overview of Youth Employment (Child Labor) Provision of the Fair Labor
Standards Act for Agricultural Occupations.” (Revised Dec 2016). United States Department of Labor. Retrieved from https://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs40.htm.
“Handy Reference Guide to the Fair Labor Standards Act” (Revised Sep 2016). United States Department of Labor. Retrieved from
https://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/hrg.htm.
Neff, Z. (17 Nov 2011). “Child Farmworkers in the United States: A Worst Form of Child
Labor”. Brown Human Rights Report. Retrieved from https://www.hrw.org/news/2011/11/17/child-farmworkers-united-states-worst-form-child-labor.
Peralta, E. (27 Apr 2012). “Obama Administration Backs Down From New Child-Labor Rules
On Farms”. National Public Radio. Retrieved from
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/04/27/151532873/obama-
administration-backs-down-from-new-child-labor-rules-on-farms.
Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. “President Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease bill to give
aid to Britain and China (1941)”. Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lend-Lease. 9 Feb 2019.
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