Backsliding on Child Protections: The Return of Child Labor in the US

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(01:52):
The. Welcome everyone.
My name is Matt Helmer and I'm the Director of Job Quality and
Worker well-being at the Economic Opportunities Program
at the Aspen Institute. It's my pleasure to welcome you
to today's conversation titled Backsliding on Child
Protections, The Return of ChildLabor in the United States.

(02:14):
This conversation is part of ourOpportunity in America series.
During this series, we try to bring a variety of different
people together, from researchers to practitioners to
advocates, to organized labor, to workers and businesses, and
many more to talk about the changing economic landscape in
our country and how we can make sure that we try to build an

(02:35):
economy that works for everyone.For those of you who joined
early, before the event started,you saw a display of photographs
and those were curated by my colleague Nora Heffernan that
represent that were images of child labor from the the last
century. Most of those photos came from a
collection by Louis Wicks Hein, who was a sociologist and

(02:56):
photographer at that time who documented child labor.
His photographs for the NationalChild Labor Committee really
were key in exposing the harsh realities of child labor during
that time and they really helpedspark national reform and remain
some iconic symbols of of that time period and of social
change. Those photos were donated to the

(03:17):
Library of Congress, where they remain today.
I think they're a reminder of where we've been and kind of
where we are in some respects, but they're also a reminder of
the power of art in changing howwe think about and view the
world, and a reminder of how artcan lead us to change and reform
as well. We'll be come back to those in
just a minute. But before we get started, just

(03:38):
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(04:00):
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(04:20):
bottom of your screen to activate them.
Now to today's event. This is the first conversation
in a two-part series that we're titling exploring the past,
present and future of youth at work.
I think in the United States, you know, one's first job is, is
kind of a rite of passage in some respects, right?
And some of us who are older maybe carry images of what work

(04:43):
looks like for a young person, you know, kids delivering
newspapers to the extent newspapers are still still
around in that form, maybe mowing lawns, working a few
hours after school at a family restaurant, bagging groceries,
maybe helping on the family farm.
There's kind of a mythology, I think, around these experiences
about learning responsibility, you know, earning your money to

(05:06):
buy your first car, save for college, developing a work
ethic. And, you know, part of that is
all still true. That still does happen and it is
possible, I think to design good, meaningful and safe jobs
for for age appropriate youth. And many youth do need to work
right. They do need to save for college
or they do need to to support their family, help support their

(05:27):
families in many respects. But I think good jobs for youth
have become somewhat of the exception as well.
And what we know about work for youth today, I think often fell
falls well short of some of those, you know, kind of
nostalgic images we have in our minds.
So in this series, we're lookingat kind of two related

(05:48):
overlapping interconnected issues.
Today we're going to focus on anarray of child labor issues and
violations. So kids too young to work, kids
working in dangerous jobs and then places they have no
business working in and kids working longer hours than
allowed by law are some of the things we're going to talk
about. In the second conversation that

(06:09):
we'll have in 2026. We're going to shift focus a
little bit to think about what good work looks like for age
appropriate youth. How do we create work
experiences that genuine genuinely benefit young people?
What protections and supports dothey need?
What does a good job look like again, for an age appropriate
youth? That'll come in 2026.

(06:29):
But beginning with the the images, the issues of child
labor today where we're going tofocus, you know, I think those
images that we showed before theevents with from Lewis Wicks,
Hein, they're from the distant past.
But some of those same types of horrors continue more than more
than 100 years later today. Many of us have heard the
terrible stories over the last couple of years of, of young

(06:51):
children being severely harmed or killed on farms and meat
processing plants and construction sites.
We've heard about 11 and 12 yearolds working overnight cleaning
the floors of of slaughterhouses, children on
tobacco farms being exposed to really noxious and dangerous
chemicals. These tragedies are, you know,

(07:12):
pretty hard to fathom from from my perspective.
They're impossible to excuse andI think represent yet another
example of us failing to live upto, I think what we, many of us
hold as a sacred commitment to protect our children.
So they're really kind of unbecoming, I think, of who we
say we are as a country. Now.

(07:32):
Alongside these really big whores and tragedies are a
number of other common child violation, child labor law
violations that we're going to talk about today.
So again, kids working too many hours late in the night at a
grocery store, fast food restaurant, underage kids
working that shouldn't be kids operating dangerous machinery
and kids really having their childhood education and their

(07:55):
lives kind of stolen from underneath them as these
tragedies have unfolded. And what we're going to explore
today too, is we've seen states working weakening child labor
laws, allowing even younger children to work, expanding
permissible hours, reducing restrictions on hazardous
occupations. We some, we've seen some states
strengthen protections too, though we'll talk about that a

(08:17):
bit as well. You know, our kids, all of our
kids, whether they're born in the US or they've travelled here
from elsewhere looking for a better life.
You know, this is this is a really urgent issue and I think
we need immediate action around it.
We need an economy where this type of exploitation of children

(08:37):
and of workers in general is notjust illegal, but it's really
kind of unthinkable. I'll close by saying, in a
recent conversation I had with someone in the UK who was asking
about what we had kind of comingup in terms of events and
discussions, I said we're going to do something on child labor.
And he said child labor really in the United States.

(08:57):
Like, he was just so shocked andappalled and like, flabbergasted
that this was still an issue in the United States.
And I think the hard truth is that while this issue has been
rising in recent years and getting a little bit more
attention, again, it's kind of an issue that's that's never
left us, right? We've made a lot of progress
since where we were 100 years ago.
But these types of tragedies still still happen.

(09:21):
We've gotten better at hiding them, maybe pretending that they
don't exist. And I think one of the hard
truths is, is sometimes we may not care as much because some of
the kids, they're being harmed and and killed in this work,
most frequently are kids that have brown skin.
And that's just a harsh reality that existed 100 years ago and
is one that is carrying through till today.

(09:44):
So I think this is kind of wherewe are.
It's where we've been. But you know, it doesn't have to
be where we go, right? So, so how do we build a better
future for the kids that are ourfuture, as we often say, is what
we're going to talk about today.We have a great panel that's
going to dive more into this, but I'm going to introduce our
first opening speaker, Yesenia Quail.

(10:06):
Yesenia is the Co founder and executive director of NC Field,
a nonprofit that works with families in rural North Carolina
to improve their health, livelihoods and working
conditions. Yesenia, I'll turn it over to
you. Hello, good afternoon or good
morning, depending on all the people who are watching from My
Name is Yesenia, and I'm so gladto be here.

(10:28):
Children working beside their parents build character.
Early mornings in the fields teach discipline.
Protecting the American farm means protecting a way of life,
a cherished, wholesome piece of American culture.
It's a compelling story. It's comforting.
And if you listen to those who defend child labor and
agriculture today, you'll hear it repeated again and again as

(10:51):
if the entire future of Americanfarming depends on children
learning the family business by performing the work my family
did while the ones who supervisesat in their air conditioned
trucks, tractors, or rode aroundand rows on their ATVs and golf
carts. And all my years working in
tobacco, I never worked alongside a farmer's daughter
son. I never met the white, non

(11:12):
Hispanic children whose right tolearn to farm supposedly
requires the preservation of child labor exemptions.
Those children aren't in the rows at 5:00 in the morning.
They aren't the ones absorbing nicotine equivalent to smoking
an entire pack of cigarettes through their skin or working
inside a poultry or hog operation.
The children in America's fieldsare immigrant children and

(11:33):
children of color. So brown children, black
children, poor children. Children whose families are held
hostage by systems that were never designed for them to move
upward. So if we're going to talk about
legacy, we need to be honest about which legacies are
actually being protected. There is a legacy we say we are
preserving the nostalgic image of a small family farm.

(11:56):
And then there's a legacy we're actually preserving, the one
rooted in slavery, exploitation,and the belief that certain farm
workers, including children, belong to those who profit from
their labor. In our experience, emergency
responders have told us that if a worker calls for help or if
there's a hurricane evacuation order, they call the grower
first. Not the worker, not the family.

(12:18):
Because unspoken assumption is that workers on the farm are
part of the growers property, part of the operation, part of
asset. This is normalized plantation
logic repackaged for the modern day.
And growing up, I heard the samemessages that every farm worker
child hears. And because our skin color is
darker, we can withstand the sunlonger.

(12:38):
That we don't need as much water, That drinking cold water
will make us sick. That thirst is normal,
exhaustion is normal, and the pain is normal.
These aren't harmless myths. They are the everyday
instructions for humans expectedto work in conditions that are
unimaginable to most people in this nation.
When I talk about child labor inthis country, I'm not reaching

(13:00):
back through history books. I'm reaching back to the rows of
tobacco where I and so many others grew up.
At 14, I stood in fields that felt endless, wrapped in a trash
bag I thought would keep me dry,never knowing it would trap the
nicotine and pesticides against my skin.
By noon, my head spun from dehydration.
My stomach twisted from the chemicals absorbed through my

(13:20):
skin. My hands were sticky with tar.
This wasn't 1910. This wasn't a story from some
distant past. This was eastern North Carolina.
I was like, and it's happening today and it's going to happen
again tomorrow. We find children in poultry
barns. We find them in hog farms,
inhaling ammonia strong enough to choke an adult.

(13:40):
We find them gently but quickly harvesting our Mother's Day
flowers, harvesting the blueberries, kale, and cabbage
that show up washed and beautiful in grocery stores.
People want to believe our experiences are accidents, gaps,
oversights, cracks in the system.
But these aren't cracks. It is the system.
A system that relies on extreme poverty.
A system that relies on familieswho can't afford a car even if

(14:02):
they had the right to drive. Parents who are so busy
surviving by ensuring our food supply that there's no time to
learn English, who don't understand the bureaucratic maze
required to access healthcare orschool services or wage
protections. A system designed so that
mobility is impossible, so that children's labor often becomes
the only buffer between survivaland collapse.

(14:23):
We inherited an agricultural framework exempt from the farm
Labor Standards, an exemption powerful enough that no advocacy
campaign has ever defeated it. And because that exemption
exists, children, mostly immigrants, mostly brown and
black, mostly invisible, are still working today in
conditions that routinely cause irreversible organ damage, heat
strokes, and death. That's not a loophole, it's a

(14:46):
caste system. A legacy not inherently noble is
simply that we've repeated it solong.
We repeated it long enough to stop questioning insanity.
Slavery is also part of that American farm legacy.
So it's racism, disenfranchisement, and the
quiet comfort with which this country assigns hardship to
certain communities while preserving opportunities for
others. If we want to change the

(15:08):
trajectory of their American story, we have to start by
telling the truth about the systems we inherited, and then
we must be bold enough to build the systems no one has yet
imagined. That requires asking different
questions. Not how do we reduce violations,
but how do we ensure no child's labor is required for their
family to eat? Not how do we expand the labor
supply, But what would this country look like if every

(15:30):
worker, including farm workers, had rights, protections and
dignity? Not how do we tweak the
framework, but how do we redesign it so that no community
is left invisible and protected or without the dignity of
healthy food, opportunity and safety?
That work requires more than policy expertise.
That requires moral clarity. This is about justice, and
justice means centering the people closest to the pain, not

(15:52):
as stories to be told, but as architects of its solutions.
There is another American legacy.
We need to acknowledge the persistent message that children
like me belong and feels, but not in the future, that we are
perfect for harvesting this nation's food.
But we're never meant to contribute to rooms where people
are debating outcomes to shape our very lives.
Look, locally, we know this much.

(16:13):
You can't end child labor without replacing the income
that child labor currently propsup.
Otherwise, you're not protectingus or collapsing our families.
Before we can remove children from fields, we must replace the
income that current systems havestolen from their families.
Higher adult wages, stable winter income, mobility to train
and reach other jobs, market premiums for child free produce,

(16:34):
and access to small farm enterprise development.
These are few examples of the essential economic foundation
that makes ending child labor possible.
In this room, I'm imagining there are decades of dedication
to this effort, people who work tirelessly to influence
policies, shape supply chains and form public imagination and
hold institutional power. Your presence here is not an

(16:55):
accident. It's a signal, and that signal
comes with responsibility. Every person here represents a
part of the system we are tryingto transform.
The choices you make, such as the standards that are enforced,
will determine whether the next generation of rural children of
color spend their summers learning and laughing or
standing in a tobacco field wearing a trash bag to keep
chemicals off their skin. If we love food, we must love

(17:17):
the people who produce it. If we care about children, we
must care about the conditions they are growing and working in.
And if we care about justice, then silence and nostalgia
cannot carry us forward. Only courage can.
We are all planting something, whether we mean to or not.
The only question that matters now is what will your choices
grow and who will inherit the world you help shape?

(17:38):
The future I hope for will not arrive on its own.
I understand my responsibility to help build it clearly,
intentionally and together so the next generation of children
doesn't have to survive what toomany of us continue to endure.
Thank you. Thank you so much, Yesenia.
That was that was wonderful. Thank you for sharing your

(18:00):
story. It's just an honor and a
privilege to to have you open upthis conversation for us.
Yesenia is going to stick aroundand as we get to audience Q&A at
the end, if you have questions for her, we'll, we'll get them
to her and bring her back into the conversation.
So now it's my pleasure to to introduce and transition to our

(18:20):
panel. We have Reid Mackey, who's the
director of child Labor Advocacyat the National Consumers League
and coordinates the National Child Labor Coalition.
You can read more about their BIOS on the website.
By the way, I'm just going to put names and titles to faces.
We have Ron Estrada, who's the CEO of Farm Worker Justice, Nina
Mast, who is a policy and economic analyst at the Economic

(18:41):
Policy Institute, and Charlie Wishman, President of the Iowa
Federation of Labor, AFLCIO. And we're so grateful to have
Christina Cook from Reuters here, who was part of a team of
journalists who are finalists for a Pulitzer Prize in 2023 for
their reporting on migrant childlabor in the US So Christina's
the perfect moderator for this conversation.

(19:03):
Christina, I'll turn it over to you.
Thanks for being here. So much for having me and I'm
really looking forward to hearing from the panelists on
this important topic. One thing that struck me from
our reporting on migrant child labor was just how young some of
these children were who were working in these dangerous jobs
in the the poultry and automotive industry.

(19:24):
And you know, as we had just heard from Yesenia in the in the
farm worker industry as well. And also just how challenging
enforcement was in part due to limited resources and this
ecosystem of Labor brokers that muddied accountability, but, you
know, also the the extreme poverty that these families were
finding themselves in that they were making these decisions to

(19:46):
send their children to work as well.
As Matt said, people don't usually think of the US when
they think about child labor. And you know, for us, when we
were reporting, it was really eye opening to see this
happening at scale in one of therichest countries in the world.
I so like I said, I really look forward to hearing from the
panelists about the the current state of play, including how

(20:10):
some states are actually loosening restrictions on
children working and how where we are fits into this historical
context. I want to make sure this is a
free flowing discussion and so I'm going to try and incorporate
questions from the audience as we as we go along.
So I'd like to get us started byhaving each of you introduce

(20:30):
yourself, your organization, a little bit about the the current
landscape. Reid, if we could begin with
you, if you could introduce yourself and talk to us a little
bit about your work and also about the history of child labor
in this country. How did we arrive at this
moment? Yeah, Thank you.
Well, I work for the National Consumers League, and we have a

(20:52):
storied history, goes back to 1899.
A lot of its work to reduce child labor.
It was very successful and, you know, in helping to reduce child
labor was done by women, great women.
Francis Perkins, who later became the Department of Labor
secretary, was one of those women.
You know, it's a time when childlabor was rampant.
Kids were working 12 hour days in factories and in, you know,

(21:15):
mills and coal mines. And a lot of that changed in
1938 when the Fair Labor Standards Act was passed.
It provided some broad protections for kids.
Unfortunately, it exempted agriculture, as you know, as you
heard Yesenia say so eloquently.So we've been working on that
issue for the last 36 years through the Child Labor

(21:37):
Coalition, which has 39 organizational members, includes
Farm Worker Justice on the panelhere, the National Education
Association, Human Rights Watch.We work closely with Yesenia, NC
Field and Nina at EPI. Great to be on the panel with
them. We work on both domestic and

(21:57):
international issue. And as I, as I indicated, you
know, our focus on domestic issues has been primarily over
the last 36 years on agriculturetrying to close those exemptions
that that Yesenia talked about. We think there are about 300,000
kids working in US agriculture. It's a pretty large number.
And it's it's it is the one sector that kids are allowed to

(22:20):
work in and large numbers that is really quite dangerous.
Agriculture has very elevated injury and fatality rates.
And we don't understand, like, if you're going to make an
exemption, why would you do it in agriculture?
And as Yuseni indicated, some ofthose decisions were rooted in
racism. So, you know, why are we

(22:43):
concerned about kids working in,on farms for long hours?
Because the kids are dropping out.
We think, you know, we hear fromallies in, in, in farm worker
communities that 80% of kids in some communities are dropping
out and they're just exhausted, you know, and they have
educational discontinuities whenthey travel and the health

(23:05):
injuries that Yesenia mentioned.They're, they're, I'll just
briefly mention a piece of legislation that would broadly
deal with this issue. It's called the Children's Act
for Responsible Employment, FarmSafety.
And it would raise the age at which kids can work from 12 to
14. And it would raise the age at
which kids can do dangerous workfrom 16 to 18, which is the same
as every other sector. You have to be an adult to do

(23:27):
dangerous work unless you're in agriculture.
So in recent years our our focushas had to shift a tiny bit
because of the expansion of, of kids and meat packing plants
that Matt mentioned, you know, kids working the night shift
doing really dangerous work withcaustic chemicals.
It got a lot of media attention.It was a grave concern.

(23:51):
And you know, so we have kind ofjumped in to do that.
And we've also been working withNina on resisting beginning of
state law protections. So I'll stop there for now.
And Ron, let's go to you next. You know, child labour is
obviously, as we've just heard from Ricky Tanian read one of
the the core issues for farm workers.

(24:13):
And it's a core issue that farm worker justice advocates on.
You know, if you could introduceyourself and farm worker
justices work on this issue. And, you know, perhaps just talk
a little bit more about how we got to that to to this point
where the rules are just that much more permissive for
children working in the fields. Yeah, absolutely.
And first of all, Kristen, thankyou for for having me here.

(24:36):
Thank you to my for my other panelists and for Aspen for
really amplifying this very important issue here.
So first let me just say farm worker Justice is a national non
profit. We were founded in 1981 to
confront the widespread exploitation of farm workers.
We originally began by bringing litigation against agricultural

(24:57):
employers who who are violating basic labor rights, and over
time we've expanded our work to include legislative and
administrative advocacy. Today, we work to improve wages,
strengthen workplace protections, expand access to
healthcare and ensure that farm workers, who have been excluded
for many federal labor, labor laws, have a meaningful voice in

(25:20):
shaping the policies that affecttheir lives.
Now, although progress has been made, many of these conditions
that we were created to fight still exist.
And you heard this from Yesenia and Reed.
You know, farm workers continue to face unsafe workplaces,
including extreme heat, dangerous pesticide exposure and

(25:40):
a lack of protective equipment. And many live in overcrowded
housing without adequate ventilation, heating, AC, or
even reliable electricity. It's hard to believe this.
I'm saying this in today's day and age.
Here in 2025, I'm reading this off for folks who are so
critical in providing the food we eat and on the job.
The workers still experience wage theft, denial of water and

(26:04):
rest breaks, and they have limited access to shade and far
too often threats of retaliationfor speaking up about the abuses
as what they encounter. But for decades FJ our farm
worker Justice, we've served as a convener for the farm worker
advocacy community. We help to coordinate strategy.

(26:24):
We join coalitions and build coalitions like Reed's CLC child
labor coalitions, and we defend critical rules and legislation
that impact farm workers and theUS food system.
Now, I will say this, as Useni and Reed previously mentioned,
these injustices traced back to the agricultural exceptionalism
built into the Fair Labor Standard Act.

(26:46):
And this is, which was passed inthe 1930s.
That's, that's, that's somethingI know we're going to continue
to talk about. But I, I wanted to say this.
And with this, the reality is clear.
Children as young as 12 are still legally doing work in the
fields that would be illegal anywhere else.
FJ is fighting to change that. We're doing this by pushing for

(27:09):
stronger regulations, protectingfamilies and challenging
outdated exemptions. We're working to ensure that
every child can grow up safe, healthy and free from
exploitation. Ending agricultural
exceptionalism. It's it's not just a policy
issue, it's a moral imperative and the time for all of us to
act as now. Nina, let's turn to you next

(27:34):
about EPI and Aaron's work on child labour.
I'm just interested in hearing from you about what you see as
what the stakes are for the children and the workers, but
also in, you know, in the current environment if what are
you seeing that that you think people should be focused on?
Yeah, thank you. So as Reid mentioned, you know,

(27:58):
just to start, EPI Economic Policy Institute is a non
partisan think tank that has been working for almost 40 years
now to center the experiences oflow and middle income workers,
to center their interest in economic policy discussions.
And we work across a range of issues.
Child labour was not historically an issue area that

(28:20):
we focused on until early 2023 when staff on the URN team,
which is our economic analysis and research network.
This is kind of our state and local policy focused arm of EPI.
We started noticing this trend of multiple states proposing
bills to weaken state child Labor Standards and that's when

(28:41):
we started reaching out to our network, which is a network of
nearly 60 state based research and policy organizations working
on range of economic justice andracial justice issues.
We started reaching out to folksto understand what they were
seeing, how these bills were playing out at the state level.
And since that time, we've been really working closely with our

(29:02):
state based partners to create awareness around bills that seek
to roll back child Labor Standards at the state level and
also encouraging lawmakers to propose strength stronger
standards. Because, you know, as we've
discussed so far in this webinar, child labour is an
issue that most people have assumed kind of have has gone

(29:25):
away in this country. And it's not it's no longer an
issue, but states actually have historically played a very
strong role in advancing protections for youth workers.
And so that is a, so those standards are what we're
encouraging lawmakers and our advocates and states to take
another look at and see how theycan strengthen as opposed to

(29:47):
the, the, the trend we have seento actually weaken those
standards in many states. And I think, you know, even
though a lot of our partner organizations historically
haven't worked on child labor, they recognize it as connected
to a lot of the issues they already focus on, whether that's
immigration, education, other Labor Standards issues.

(30:08):
And they also correctly see it the issue of child labor as one
part of a multi pronged right wing agenda to eliminate access
to education in this country, tomake jobs more precarious in
ways that enrich the wealthy andcorporations further.
And so I think when we think about child labor, we always try

(30:30):
to connect the dots for people and show how this is not merely
an issue of just youth employment standards.
It's a larger issue about who has access to economic
opportunity in this country, education and you know, who is
who is creating the system to limit that opportunity.

(30:51):
So I'll stop there. And going next to Charlie, Iowa
was one of the states that was working very actively on trying
to loosen child labour laws, andyou were actively advocating
against that. Could you tell us a little bit
about yourself and the Iowa Federation of Labour and you
know why child labour became this issue for for you?

(31:12):
Well, first of all, thank you for having me.
I think after everything, Yesenia said.
I think we can all go home because we do have an entire
look. How long have we been working on
this? As I like to say, nothing is
ever really settled when it comes to capitalism.
So this is never stopped. We've never stopped working on

(31:34):
it. And look how did, how do we
fight this? Look, Reed, I wore a turtleneck
today because I'm with a lot of you academic folks.
But Reed and Nina make us sound smart in interviews.
But I'm more happy going up. And if you're going to come
after kids, we will repeatedly. The labor movement in the States

(31:54):
will just repeatedly punch you in the face until you stop.
And that's basically that's we. I didn't literally or nobody
literally punched anyone in the face, but I would have been
happy to. And oh, we're not supposed to
tell you that kind of thing. Sorry.
So a lot of really, really good,thoughtful organizing a strategy

(32:17):
that involves inside and outside.
But yeah, the labor movement in the states, like, sorry, we
settled this about 120 years ago.
And I don't know, we got ourselves banned from parts of
the capital, the state capital. I mean, we raised hell all over
this state. I think in addition to that, we

(32:40):
we put the Republicans in a really crappy spot here.
Like, hey, if you want to vote on whether or not a 16 year old
girl can serve beer at Hooters and let's put the actual in an
amendment, let's put the the size of the outfit you want to
vote on whether or not 16 year olds can wear that at work.

(33:03):
Cool, thanks. Republicans, you want to have
that fight do that or you can actually strip the bill down.
So when it comes to this particular issue, I don't feel
really bad about being really tough on people.
And at the end of the day, they kind of get it about a minute
before the start. The House Minority Leader or

(33:23):
Majority Leader who I thought onthis for so much and who
actually banned us from the second entire second floor of
the Capitol, called me about something.
So you can move forward on thesesorts of things, but you cannot
back down. This is not a negotiable issue.
And this is something that at the end of the day between Reed

(33:49):
and Nina and Jen and everybody in state, all of our union and
affiliates are, are everybody that was involved in this fight.
And it was a movement fight. I truly believe that in the last
two years at least some parent didn't have to put their kids 6

(34:10):
foot in the ground thanks to thework that folks like Reed and
Nina and so on helped us with. So thank you both for that.
But this, this isn't over and it's continuing on and I'll just
probably shut up right now. I've already sounded weird
enough talking about punching people, but come after kids.

(34:32):
Happy to. Thanks so much everyone.
And Reid, if we go back to you, you, what are some of the common
wage and hour violations that you know, that you've seen from
industry, such as fast food and meat packing or, or you know,
restaurants as Charlie was just talking about?
Well, yeah, we've seen a ton of violations during the Biden

(34:54):
administration's enforcement efforts on fast food.
You know, all of the major fast food companies were implicated.
Most of those concern our violations, hours violations,
you know, with kids working too many hours.
And that, you know, that may sound innocuous to the public,
but it's really, it's really important because there is
academic research that suggests that when kids work more than 20

(35:18):
hours a week during the school week, that their grades drop and
their school completion rates drop.
So we're talking about the futures of these kids, you know,
and, and, and you, when you lookat the impact of having a high
school degree or a college degree on, on young people over
the course of their lifetime, itcan be millions of dollars.

(35:39):
And so we do not want to see kids working long hours.
You know, you know, as Matt said, work, work has a place,
teenage work has a place. You know, if it's, if it's
restricted to, you know, decent hours and doesn't involve
hazardous work, we're OK with it.
But when you know when it crosses those lines, we're not

(35:59):
OK. Ron, you know, on we, we talked
a little bit about, you know, what child labour in agriculture
looks like, but could you touch us a little bit more about some
of the federal laws that are there on the books with regards
to child labour on farms? I get how.

(36:23):
How much more permissive is it? Well, let me let me start by
setting up some of the, you know, the scenario because
we've, we've all mentioned Flissa, the Fairlebo standard
acts. And really that is to the core
of what we're kind of anchored to.
And that's also the main issue that we're all talking about

(36:44):
here is that this has to be modernized.
We have to bring this up to speed.
And this is, you know, the work from previous to me and, and all
of us here, we've been trying sohard to do this.
And I think the some ways Charlie's right on.
It's like we've got to continue to hit hit back because again,
the way we've been working previously, you know, it's it's

(37:04):
just been we've just been chipping away for this.
A lot of this is hidden, and I say hidden under the term family
farming. Family farming conceals
disgusting truths about our foodindustry and when you when
whenever it is benefits the industry to, you know, again, to
justify why that there everyone's OK with having this

(37:28):
current situation with labor contractors being the buffer and
doing all the hiring for the forfor, for the the workers.
And they're all they're the onlyones at fault for these issues.
You know, they hide under familyfarm.
And again, Flissa was established in the 1930s when
there were true family farms there.
Now, let me just say something here.

(37:49):
I was at the Organic Trade association recently.
There's some good farms out there.
There's some good people out there that want to do well, but
I don't know of any good Agri businesses.
And I don't call them large farms, I call them Agri
businesses. I think by using the term farms
with them and associating the farms is misleading.
And that's something that feeds into a lot of what we're seeing

(38:09):
here. The reality is we as the public
or we as our advocates need to make the public aware of the
reality that this still is the, the, the companies, these big
corporate corporate entities andAgri businesses are all about
profit. They're about what is, you know,
how much money can we make at whatever cost.

(38:31):
And unfortunately, what we're talking about today, it's the
cost of children. And these are children.
It doesn't matter if they're undocumented or U.S. citizens,
they're children. And it is our all of our
responsibility as human beings to stand up and face this.
Can I follow up on what Ron saidthere?
I think that what, what you're talking about, Ron, I think that

(38:52):
this really poses a makes our battles even tougher in farming,
traditional farming states, right?
So, for example, you know, heck,I grew up on a 80 acre, 80 acre
Hereford cattle farm and I did all kinds of stuff that I
probably should have been doing at a really young age.
And that's just the way it was. That doesn't exist anymore.

(39:16):
But the idea that so many peoplehave in their head is, oh, well,
I worked on the farm when I was a kid and it wasn't that
dangerous. My parents watched me or
whatever. And there's this idea that's
very separated from what happened after the farm crisis
in the 80s, and then what happened with with corporate
agriculture after that, and thatwe really don't have family

(39:40):
farms anymore. But there still is this very
romantic idea and people's heads, you know, that that's
what it was. And oh, I and back to this.
Oh, I learned these values when I worked on the you know, when I
bailed hay or whatever when I was a kid.
When it's like this is really, you know, that's not what's

(40:00):
going on here. We're talking about Guatemalan
kids Who? Are working on a hog
insemination plant and or yeah let's call it a plant in
Clarion, IA and showing up to school and falling asleep right
away 'cause they're getting donewith work at 5:00 AM.
That's the reality versus what? But it like in states where
you've seen a lot of this child labor legislation, Iowa, Indiana

(40:24):
and and places like that, there is a very romanticized notion of
what farming is and was. Nina, could you talk us through
some of that legislation that's come up, some of the states that
have, you know, taken these steps towards loosening,
loosening laws? Sure.
So according to our tracking, you know, we've been doing a lot

(40:48):
of tracking on child labour legislation over the past three
years. And just in the past three
years, at least 29 states have introduced bills to roll back
state child labour protections and 10 have enacted those bills.
And, you know, many of them are Republican controlled states,
but some are not. And so I think it's important to

(41:09):
recognize that this is an issue that really cuts across politics
too. And, and that's something we
continue to be concerned about. But in terms of the changes that
that the bills make, it's kind of a there's a big menu, but
they often deal with expanding the number of hours that youth

(41:31):
can work, you know, per day or per week, often in or sometimes
in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act, like was the case
in Iowa and is now the case in Ohio with a bill that's
currently on Governor Dewine's desk.
So if you have a Direct Line to the governor, you know, send me
an e-mail. But then we also see bills to

(41:54):
create new exemptions from statechild Labor Standards, often
under the guise of work based learning or career and technical
education. So, you know, we have these bona
fide programs through which young teenagers can experience,
have work based learning experiences.
But there's this effort afoot toweaken the regulations around

(42:14):
those programs and introduce newsort of unregulated ways to
exempt minors from hazardous work protections under state
law. And then we're also seeing
efforts to lower the alcohol service age, you know, allowing
minors to work in the presence of alcohol, allowing minors to
drive vehicles on farms or driveto and from work, as was

(42:38):
recently passed again in Iowa. And then I think, yeah, I think
that mostly covers the the bevy of changes.
Oh, the other one I wanted to mention was youth sub minimum
wage. So, you know, under state and
federal law, minors can often bepaid less than the state or
federal sub minimum wage based on their occupation or their

(43:00):
student status. And we've seen efforts in many
states to expand those youth subminimum wages or implement youth
sub minimum wages in states thatdon't currently have them.
And so these are all efforts that we're working with our
partners in many states to combat, to oppose.
And we've had a lot of success and at least watering down bills
where we can't necessarily blockthem.

(43:23):
And I think to Charlie's point, like there are these pervasive
economic messages that have beenreally powerful in some of these
states. And it's been a challenge, but I
think to combat those. But I think where we've been
able to work with community and be able to be out in front of
these bills, we have seen some success in opposing them.

(43:46):
You know, I mean, it's interesting that all these bills
are happening at the same time. Do you have a sense that they're
being coordinated? There's definitely coordination.
You know, the Foundation for Government Accountability was
the big push behind many of the bills to eliminate youth work
permits across multiple states. That's a change I forgot to to

(44:09):
mention, you know, the elimination of youth work
permits in many States. And that's really dangerous
because the youth work permit system is really what is
stopping minors from being employed in hazardous or
inappropriate jobs in many states.
And so they, they were really pushing model legislation in
many states to undo those systems.
And then we've also seen industry groups oppose or we've

(44:32):
we've seen industry groups support a lot of these efforts
to roll back child labor protections in many states.
And so there's certainly a high level of coordination.
I do think that we saw a flurry of legislation coming out of the
pandemic and I think that's in part due to the fact that low
wage workers were finally seeingsome modest gains in their
wages. And you know, there was this

(44:56):
idea that we were in a tight labor market coming out of the
pandemic. And so they were seeking to
replace you adult workers with minors in many cases.
So I think there's, there's a bit of that timing element as
well with like the broader macroeconomic trends.
I, I think the other thing is that we weren't necessarily

(45:18):
ready for these bills to be, to be coming out in the wake of the
COVID-19 pandemic. I do think in, you know, maybe
in the last year or so, we've started to see a little bit
fewer of these bills. And that's definitely a welcome
sign compared to the number of bills that we've seen that
actually propose stronger protections.

(45:39):
And so I think there has been a shift and that's been really
exciting to see. Charlie, in Iowa, were there
particular arguments that you made that you felt broke
through, you know, that that people took on board when you
made them about, about the childlabor bill suggestions there?

(46:01):
Yeah, absolutely. Off the bat.
Well, first of all, they didn't,they weren't prepared for us
because we got the bill leaked to us and we went to the media
with it first and framed it and framed them as being crazy for
wanting to put kids back into mines.
Right. Like it's really easy to make
them look terrible over and overand over every single day when

(46:25):
you have when it's again there. There's things like mining in
the bill. There's things like packing
houses in the bill that like Iowans know instinctually there
are some really, really big problems with.
And like I yeah, I was saying earlier, the way to force you
when you have little to no bargaining power in any

(46:46):
situation but using the state legislature and the governor.
And in this particular situation, the only thing you
can do, you can ask them very, very nicely, but they do not
care. The only thing you can do is in
every single way possible, through organizing at the local
level, at the state level, and in many, many different ways,

(47:11):
make them look like shit so thatthey feel like they're not going
to get re elected. That's like the only way you can
ever change a politician's mind.I'd love if politicians really
cared about good arguments and position papers, but they don't,
they have to be afraid that they're not going to be re
elected. That's the that's it.

(47:32):
And we just did a really, reallygood job using the research,
using the data, using the talking points and all of the
things that were provided to us in that our our national
partners. Some people on this call, like I
mentioned Reid and and, and Ninaas well, but really at the end
of the day, it's like, how do you make them look terrible?

(47:54):
And they make it really easy when they put some of the stuff
in that bill that they did, because it's pretty much a free
for all. It's seemed like Iowa workforce
development. The governor got together with a
whole bunch of corporations and said, hey, what do you want?
And that's the other thing rightnow that works as well wherever
you fall on the political spectrum, most people are really

(48:17):
hating on corporations right now, especially multinational
corporations and things like that.
And I'll tell you, like Tyson Foods makes a really good
villain. And so does, I mean, I could go
down the line, but there's a bunch of people that make really
good villains and happy to, theyseem happy to play the role for

(48:38):
some reason. I don't know.
But yeah, you, you don't win theentire thing.
But man, again, I think that thework that we did getting that
bill stripped down to mostly hours changes, which I don't
want to minimize as being important, but getting most of
the hazardous out, hazardous occupations out was easier to do

(49:02):
because they were, they were just egregious and outrageous.
And it's easy to make them look bad doing that so.
Charlie, you talked earlier about, you know, how they
justified some of the farm work,how they justified, you know,
having teenagers working at bars.
But you know, you the stuff thatyou were able to get stripped
out of the bill, the more hazardous work.

(49:25):
How, you know, how did they justify that?
What were their reasons for for having that in the bill?
Well. I, I think it goes to one thing
that, that Nina brought up earlier is that it's, Oh my God,
look, Iowa's number one export is young people.
And so nobody wants to stay hereand live.
And so there's not like there's an, of white people, at least

(49:50):
there's not in a growing population whatsoever.
And so there's this idea of likeand, and so there is a, there is
a workforce issue in general on I hate the these terms of middle
skill or low skill, whatever. But there is, there is a huge

(50:11):
problem when it comes to the, the, the just having enough
workers in the state to do some of the things that we need to
do. And so, yeah, you're, it does
end up, that's how I believe that they ended up getting into
meat packing, how they ended up getting into manufacturing, how

(50:31):
it ended up getting into all these sorts of things.
It's 'cause they just like, I'lltake Firestone here in, in Des
Moines, Usually they, they, theybuild AG tires.
They're USW 310 steel workers. They're normally 1200 people.
They're down to, they're about 800 or so.

(50:53):
Just this one factory. I'm using that as an example of
like, well, the AG economy slowed a bit.
I could go through the trades, Icould go through every single
sector. We don't have enough workers.
And so capitalism usually just turns to who's the easiest to
exploit. And so that's where we end up
with these child labor bills. Yeah, on that, on that front,

(51:16):
Governor DeSantis has explicitlyargued that we're deporting a
lot of immigrants, so we need tohire teenagers to do those jobs,
you know, these really dangerous, difficult jobs.
So it's it's a crazy argument. Reid, I, I, I'd love for you to
expand on that a little bit, because it's kind of impossible
to talk about exploitation in these industries without talking

(51:38):
about immigrant labour. You know, what have you seen in
terms of the people being prepared to come forward?
The possible you know how how the how you're what you're
seeing on enforcement. Well, I think there is a
tremendous amount of fear at themoment, you know, because of ICE

(52:00):
and all of these crazy immigration activities.
People are really, really afraid.
And, you know, human rights are being abused every day.
We, you know, we see it. I, I, you know, I, I think these
are very vulnerable workers. A lot, a lot of the kids that
ended up in the meatpacking plants for unaccompanied minors.

(52:20):
There was a surge in unaccompanied minors over a four
year period where like 120,000 kids were coming in a year.
And these are, these were young kids who, you know, should not
have been in meatpacking. You know, it's, you have to be
18 to work in those factories, but they were getting in with
fake IDs and the companies were not looking, They kind of look

(52:40):
the other way. So incredibly vulnerable kids
that, you know, are desperate for money, willing to do, you
know, almost anything for it. And, and now, you know, it's a
little unclear like ours, you know, are, are there still large
numbers of these kids entering the plants?
You know, with the border havingbeen basically shut down?

(53:01):
There's a, there's a lot of uncertainty at the moment right
now. What's what's happening in those
plants? And you at the at the farm work
from farm worker justice perspective, Ron, what are you
seeing in terms of, you know, how immigration enforcement

(53:22):
might be playing into the the labor in the fields?
Well, just to piggyback off of Richard Fear, there's there's,
there's fear and there's actual,you know, the actual actions of
removal. And again, just to be clear,
this is not just undocumented, these are, they're actually
targeting US farm workers as well.

(53:44):
And there's really very little disregard that that is the case
from from the administration here for this.
So in any environment, right, you're, you're going to have
folks who are not only afraid togo to work, they're afraid to go
to school, they're afraid to go to churches, they're afraid to
go to hospitals. And keep in mind that the, the

(54:04):
data, and this is something I can, I'm sure could validate is
rural communities, rural Americaare largely based on, you know,
the workers from the ag industryand farm workers and, and
immigrant communities and communities of color that are
thriving and keeping these communities around.
So it certainly is a trickle down effect that you when you

(54:26):
impact one workforce such as farm workers and that impact
again, it's fear we're seeing infear alone is it's going to have
that ripple effect. Now we know of already some
farms in Texas, some farms in the Midwest that are actually
beginning to not only lose harvest and lose crops, but are
seriously thinking about closingdown.

(54:48):
And one of the things that we'reseeing as in as some solution
currently from the administration is you're hearing
a lot about H2A workers. Let's keep in mind the H2A guest
worker program is, was created as a temporary fix, a temporary
solution. It was not, it was not created
for a permanent solution to whatwe're dealing with in terms of

(55:11):
workforce stabilization in the US farms.
So right now we are looking at aBand-Aid effect here.
And not only are we looking at aBand-Aid effect, but because of
the rhetoric that we're seeing that this country is, is, you
know, it's coming out of the coming out of Washington, we're
starting to see decreasing decreases in the number of

(55:32):
individuals that are looking to apply as a guest worker program.
So this is this folks, this is apotential train work in our food
system that we're seeing as a result of of how the immigrants
in this community are being treated.
Now, one of the things I want towant to take this back down to
child labor here is one of the roots of child labor that we're

(55:53):
seeing is obviously is the economic status of the the
families. So when they stop going to work,
there's the revenue and money stop, you know, stops, stops
flowing into the families in in fact, there's a need for in some
cases there, there's a there's this need and, and for the

(56:16):
children to come in and help support the families here.
But what we start is what we fight it constantly for and have
been for for decades, is that some type of legal status in
federal legislation be included.In fact, there is a bill, Farm
Workforce Modernization Act, been introduced 4 times,

(56:36):
bipartisan support. It's had bipartisan support, and
it's actually passed the House acouple times.
It is something that if you lookat the supporters, these are
folks who are familiar with AG, they're familiar with industry
and the importance of having a stable workforce.
But again, I go back to, you know, the industry and those

(56:56):
players that, you know, that arecontrolling the industry and
that are halting or stopping this type of legislation, which
this country solely needs, you know, in addition to really
address the child labor, but to provide food on our tables.
So this is something that is, you know, we're not going to
hear the last of it. This is going to continue.
And lastly, I would say it's a, it's real time for us for farm

(57:19):
worker justice. We're working with other farm
worker advocates on the interim final rule that was put out by
the Department of Labor. We're leading some comments to
really again to re educate and create awareness of and these
concerns that I've just shared. And there's another concurrent
issue going on to the adverse effect wage rate, which is

(57:39):
basically looking to at a time when we're looking to supposedly
increase and support US, the US workforce, we're going
backwards. We are looking by, by decreasing
wages for H2A guest workers, we're conversely decreasing the
wages for US workers. So again, it's just a lot going

(58:01):
on here and and this is something that we will continue
to continue to fight for. This might be one for Charlie.
It's an audience question. Are are the arguments that
proponents of weaker standards use?
You know, do do messages of parents rights play into this?

(58:22):
Well, sure. That is one of the main talking
points here. I think on on the other side, I
think that, you know, as far as the the actual debate goes, you
know, my, my responses to that always had to do with you're
right, it is about parents rights of this bill was written

(58:45):
or these bills are written by corporations.
And quite honestly, the the manager at Chili's does not give
a crap if your kid has their homework done, but the but the
parents actually do. So the parents aren't really
able to control whether or not the the kids are getting
scheduled till 9:00 and then they have to drive 45 minutes

(59:09):
home and then they might get to doing their homework at 10.
But we know that that's probablynot the case.
So yeah, there's a big, you know, that was the way I think
that that we always came back atthat.
But it is a very, very strong argument as we're with, you
know, parental rights is always going to be a very strong

(59:32):
argument. But it's like, you're right, it
parents, not corporations, know what's best for for their kids,
so. Another audience question maybe
for Reed was asking for insightsspecifically for the three PL.
industry. So warehousing and
transportation, what are you seeing there and and where?

(59:57):
Well, I haven't seen specific child labor allegations against
the warehouse warehouses. I don't know if it maybe Nina
has, she's been monitoring activities in the States, but I
haven't really seen much, much child labor activity with those
facilities. But, you know, certainly, yeah.
Go ahead, Nina. Oh, I was just going to say I

(01:00:19):
haven't either. But I think, I think to the
extent that warehousing and transportation are two highly
fissured industries, you know, where the work plate, the
workplace structure is governed by layers and layers of
contracting and subcontracting. That is a key risk factor for
child labor violations because you have kind of this diffusion

(01:00:43):
of responsibility across the employer and no one is
necessarily checking to make sure that there's no child labor
across the supply chain. And when violations are found,
many times the, you know, the corporate, the corporation that
is in charge of the entire supply chain is at the top, can
avoid responsibility because they weren't the direct
employer. And, you know, we so, so as we

(01:01:06):
see our economy become more efficient across many types of
industries, including warehousing and transportation,
I think that will necessarily lead to more child labor
violations. And unfortunately, even at the
federal level, we still don't have have a great way of dealing
with that because of the issues related to joint employer
standards. And the Biden administration did

(01:01:28):
make some strides on enforcementof these types of situations,
but there's still a long way to go.
Can I just, I look, I just want to Nina made such a great point
because child labor, wage left misclassification and
independent contracting are all such interrelated issues,

(01:01:49):
especially when it comes to construction, specifically kids
working on roofs and where we see so many really, really
dangerous situations. But a general contractor Subs
out the work to a random sub that you don't know and you
cannot track them down later andpoof, they're gone.

(01:02:11):
You know, and nobody's responsible ever.
And that's, that always happens.It happens around.
So not only do kids get exploited, put in dangerous
positions, don't have any work comp on them, no unemployment,
anything like that. But if there is something that
happens where they fall off the roof, they're pretty much left

(01:02:32):
high and dry and have no medicalcoverage at that point other
than to. Sometimes the subcontractor will
just take the kid to the ER and drop him off there and leave.
Yeah, If I can add Christina just to Charlie's point.
And for the very few, very, veryfew that somehow may get caught,

(01:02:54):
the fine that they have to deal with this, it's so low, it's
actually a line item budget. So they budget the the growers
and owners and in this case farms budget to pay that.
And it's really has no deterrentat all to to have them change or
not. And I and and I just wanted to
add that to that because that's that's worth worth sharing.

(01:03:18):
There's another audience question about how we can
improve and expand valid sourcesof data on child labour in order
to continue to expose the situation.
Maybe that's one for Nina. Yeah, I can take a shot at this,
and I welcome others to also weigh in.
But I mean, data availability isdefinitely a huge problem in the

(01:03:39):
child labor context. I mean, we don't even have data
on employment at the national level for minors under 15.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics simply does not collect it.
And so that's a major limitation, especially because
in agriculture you have minors working at much lower ages and
in work that's maybe more informal, it's harder to reach
them. And so I think agriculture data,

(01:04:01):
agricultural data that is particularly difficult to come
by. And that's really a problem
because agriculture is the most dangerous industry for youth
workers. And so I think, you know, there
were efforts that were begun under the Biden administration.
I know that the Government Accountability Office was
looking into updating a 2018 report on working children that

(01:04:22):
I, I participated in their initial information gathering.
I'm not sure what has become of that report.
I think it's safe to say that the Trump administration does
not have the, you know, the respect for data and the, the,
the work that goes into collecting and disseminating

(01:04:43):
these large public surveys. So it's a problem that we
certainly haven't addressed, butI think I absolutely agree that,
you know, we need better data tobe able to fully understand the
scope of this problem and to be able to provide solutions that
really center the the workers that are most impacted by these
violations. And the Trump administration has

(01:05:06):
decided to cancel the National Agricultural Worker Survey,
which has been a a real great data source for farm worker
advocates for for over 30 years.And they just decided to it
wasn't necessary anymore. It's it's kind of a ridiculous
decision. And it's going to really hurt.
It's going to hurt efforts to, you know, to help that
population. Exactly.

(01:05:28):
Yeah. That's I was.
Going to add that to that read. It's like not only do we need
data, we, we almost need to stopthose from, you know, removing
the data. The points that we and you know,
gathering that we have and that was FLS is certainly one of
them. And and I mean we, we've got to
work, we're tracking and see what Nas, what happens with Nas
as well. But again, there's the data and

(01:05:48):
then there's also once we have the data, it's just to, you
know, to really identify some type of transparent reporting of
that data. And that's a whole other issue
in itself. Ron, where do you see any, you
know, potential policy solutions?
Wow. Federal level, I mean, that is,

(01:06:10):
that's, that's really the question of the RN because we're
still in really kind of defence mode and feel like we've been
defence mode for, for years here.
I, I mentioned farm work correspondentization Act.
And again, this is really the umbrella approach to where, you
know, you're able to ensure thatthe parents can earn a living

(01:06:32):
wage that will trickle down to, you know, address some of the
issues around, you know, children wanting and having to
work. But for right now, the, you
know, again, we're, we're, we sign on to read.
I know, read, read. I don't want to take any of this
Thunder to the, the legislation that reads.

(01:06:52):
And bill, he's sharing. I know he has a link he'll share
shortly. That's certainly 1, you know,
one step. And the other is to, you know,
kind of like double click on Nina's work on the state level
and, and what Charlie's doing. I think, you know, one of the
things that FJ, you know, we're,we're national based.
We're based in DC, but we also see the opportunity to, you

(01:07:12):
know, for specific states in thework and, and, and double down
on some of the work there. And what do I, what I mean by
that is just really find any legislation or policies that we
could, you know, again, it's, it's really about concessions at
this stage. You know, that's something I'm
trying to tell our partners too.It's like, you know, we're,
we're let's, let's look at some first steps here.

(01:07:33):
And, and so for us for the longest time, you know, and it
continues to be legal status is key, But I will also share that
the need for, for education and public outreach still exists.
I'm not going to give up on that.
That's, that's something that wefeel that we, we still have.

(01:07:54):
And, and any movement, if you look over the, the, you know,
the through history, you know, it's really the people driven
movements have really been the ones that have been able to
really largely change and, and impact legislation and policy.
So that's something that we're we're looking at right now.
And there are, you know, where there were a few champions here,

(01:08:14):
as I mentioned here, that that really want to do the right
thing here. But it's unfortunate that, you
know, with just this day and ageand where we live in, it's
something that it's, it's about on the federal level, but
certainly in the state level, wecan get some wins on state,
maybe even local drill down to county and and, and, and, and

(01:08:35):
city would be another option. But again, at public education
is something that we're going to, you're going to see a lot
coming from us. Reid, I'd like to ask the same
question of you. What opportunities you see
currently at the federal level? Yeah.
So, you know, one of the bill ofthe bill that Ron was referring
to is a bill called The ChildrenDon't Belong in Tobacco Farms
Act. And, you know, kids are working

(01:08:57):
in US tobacco, they're getting sick.
They're getting a thing called green tobacco sickness, which is
basically nicotine poisoning. And you know, the, the symptoms
include dizziness and vomiting and nausea, fainting.
You know, I, I heard One North Carolina teen describe it as
feeling like I was going to die.And they, you know, the, the
kids and adults both wear black plastic garbage bags while they

(01:09:21):
work in tobacco fields to try toprevent the nicotine from going
onto their skin and making them I'll.
So we think it's a great bill. It was, it's been introduced
most recently by Representative de Lauro.
Senator Durbin has championed itfor, for over a decade in the
House that has 55 Co sponsors. So I, I think we're going to be

(01:09:41):
providing a link here for, for people who are listening, who
are willing to contact their member of Congress and say
please Co sponsor this bill either in the Senate or the
House. And you know, it's, it's a no
brainer really, cuz some, you know, tobacco's an industry that
kills 8 million people a year. You know, there really aren't
many allies of tobacco, you know, except for tobacco

(01:10:04):
farmers. And it's, it's really, I think
doing damage to kids. So we would love to see
everybody, everybody on this call.
If you want to take away action item that takes one minute,
please go go online and write toyour member of Congress or
senator and say please Co sponsor the Children Don't
Belong in Tobacco Farms act. It's all mechanized, so it's not

(01:10:27):
hard to do it all. Nina, you mentioned that some
states are going in the in a different direction and actually
trying to strengthen child labour laws.
Could you talk a little bit about what you're seeing there?
Yeah. And, you know, this has actually
been really an encouraging sign.I think in the past year, I
actually was tracking more billsto strengthen child Labor

(01:10:49):
Standards at the state level than I was seeing efforts to
roll them back. And that is kind of a new trend
we're starting to see. And so that has been really
exciting. There are so many things that
states can do to strengthen their standards.
You know, many states have childLabor Standards on the books
that haven't been touched in 60-70 years or more, but there's

(01:11:09):
a lot of opportunity there. So, you know, anything.
So I'll just give an example of Colorado that has, which has
really taken several steps in the past few years to strengthen
their standards. So first in 2023, they passed a
bill to allow victims of illegalchild labor to sue their
employer. And then in 2024, they followed
that up with a bill to make child labor victims eligible for

(01:11:32):
damages paid by the employer, aswell as increased penalties to
use them for wage theft enforcement and other types of
Labor standards enforcement. And they also removed parental
criminal liability from state code.
And these changes are really important because we know that
children and their families are often scared to come forward to

(01:11:53):
report child labor violations. And under many state laws, they
really have nothing to gain. They only have something to
lose, which is losing their job.And so these types of changes
take a really important step forward to actually compensating
victims for, for child labor violations and increasing
penalties to levels that actually will deter violations.

(01:12:15):
So, and we're, you know, there'sa range of other policy
solutions that we're seeing in many other States.
And you can, you can view them all on our Holding the Line
series brief on child labor, where we provide a pretty
comprehensive menu of all the different legislative options
available to states. And some states are also doing
this through the rule making process.
You know, you, you know, there are other options besides

(01:12:39):
legislation to protect child labor or to advance child Labor
Standards. So I encourage folks to to check
that out. But you know, at the federal
level too and at the state level, we really need to be
raising the minimum wage and eliminating harmful sub minimum
wages for youth workers and for all workers.
Because that is really at the root of some of the child labor

(01:13:02):
violations we're seeing is that,you know, workers need to be
paid living wage. And I think that would go a long
way in preventing some of the issues we're seeing at the state
level. We have an audience question.
Who are to unexpected partners in coalitions to defend against
backsliding in child labour protections.

(01:13:26):
You know who wants to take that?Charlie?
You know, so I would, again, it's hard to find people for
this and they, gosh, let me justsay it was a very, very easy
thing when we were doing a lot of when Labour in the state was

(01:13:49):
doing a lot of events and a lot of press and all over the state
and really raising the profile of this.
It was next thing, you know, I mean, the other, you know, part
of this ended up being the strategy of the, the League of
Women Voters showing up to the, you know, like they don't care
about me as much hollering at them 'cause they're used to

(01:14:10):
that. But like when the little old
ladies from Leave with voters show up at the forums, then they
start to get scared that this isa real issue, right?
And it's like, I don't know, again, I'll go back to what I
said earlier is all the policy papers in the world don't stop
this stuff. But politicians being afraid

(01:14:30):
that they're going to lose theirjobs, that is what stops or at
least allows compromise in our favor on this sort of thing.
So you have to engage the public, whatever coalitions you
can build. And it's hard to find people in
favor of sending kids back into packing houses and into mines

(01:14:51):
and things like that. So this was an easy one to find
some fine allies on. In, in our tobacco work, we've
actually found that some of the companies and some of the
industry groups have acknowledged that it's work
that's not really fit for kids under 16.
You know, we're trying to ban itfor kids under 18 and they won't

(01:15:12):
go that far. But it, you know, it's, it's
interesting that they that they basically say, yeah, this, this
work is, you know, dangerous. And it's not that it's not that
great for, for young kids. So that was a bit of a surprise.
JB I'll say in our, in our case,JBS Reid, I don't know if you
remember when JBS actually came out with a letter because the

(01:15:34):
UFCW was very, very active in this, right?
And the the CEO of JBS was getting ready to go on some oh
gosh, I can't. I think he was doing a press
conference with somebody or going to be on CNBC or something
like that. And they said, well, what would
happen if what happens? But how do you answer the
question if they bring up the Iowa child labor law?
He's like, what? I don't know anything about

(01:15:56):
this. He's like, well, what if this
bill allows people under 18 to work in your plants?
He's like, I don't want anybody under 18 working in my plants.
So the next thing you know, the FCW and JBS, it's not like we
could get Tyson or some of the other ones.
But, and by the way, JBS then later got popped for child labor

(01:16:16):
violations not long ago. So they're not some heroes, but
they were unlikely suspect. When it's like, hey dude, you
might have to answer for this onnational TV.
Yeah, I, I just want to add to the couple things is the US
Conference of Catholic Bishops came up with a statement

(01:16:41):
recently which it was very, you know, some very rare for them to
do. I think the previous statement
was on ACA and it was focused, although it was focused on the
treatment of immigrants. They too would be, you know, a
partner that we, you know, faith-based groups and such to
consider looking at. And I would also too, one of the

(01:17:01):
things that I'll share with someof our work that we've done with
some of our groups in, in this public outreach phase that I've
shared is also Chambers of Commerce.
And the Chambers of Commerce have been, it's, you know, I,
I've been, I've been really kindof promoting to expand the
network outside of farm worker advocates and such and non

(01:17:24):
traditional partners that, you know, will make people scratch
their heads or why, you know, where the connect, where's the
connection and such. And So what we've been doing is
connecting this to, you know, the pocketbooks of consumers.
And this was one of the messagesand share like, you know, to to
the degree where the workforce of farm workers go.
So does the cost that you're going to be spaying at a grocer,

(01:17:45):
A retailer's grocery store. So the the business community
here, you know, we all know, again, it's kind of like that,
you know, let's, let's see if wecan find some ways to have them
work for us. And these are mainly small
businesses, the small grocers, the bodegas and, and, and the
markets of the world to get themworking for us.
And and talk about the economic mobility piece to this and how

(01:18:09):
this could be something that is also key for, you know, for
potential solutions and partnerships.
And we have Yesenia back for theaudience question portion of
this. So Yesenia, I think you have
something to add as well on the question on partners.
Yeah, absolutely. So we have had some unlikely

(01:18:30):
partners, especially whenever we've turned to groups like our
faith-based communities. I know that they've been really
helpful. I know that a lot of our
environmental justice groups have been really supportive of
the work as it relates to just how do we to help other humans?
How do we help other people? I think that using the broader
definition, especially whenever we look at things like

(01:18:52):
environmental justice and the reality is that environmental
justice is people justice. So I, I think that expanding and
recognizing that whenever we talk about agriculture, whenever
we talk about child labor, we are talking about things like
education and health. I was like, there's
interconnectivity between all ofthis.
It's kind of hard to address 1 without addressing the other.

(01:19:13):
So a question about whether the data shows any correlation
between modifications to child labour laws and subsequent or
lag changes in educational outcomes across states or
regions. Is there evidence, you know,
what evidence do we have on how these policies affect schooling
over time? Maybe Nina if.

(01:19:37):
Yeah. I mean, I think unfortunately
because these laws are so new, it's largely too soon to be able
to see what the long range outcomes are going to be.
But I think we can be pretty confident that states rolling
back child labour laws will be will lead to lower educational
attainment for youth in some of these areas, particularly areas
that are already struggling withhigh absenteeism rates, low

(01:20:00):
graduation rates, which obviously come with a range of
negative outcomes for these workers into adulthood.
But we do have some, we have some recent evidence on the
importance of employment certificates or youth work
permits in preventing violations.
So there's a relatively new paper that we can share after
the webinar that shows that states that have youth work

(01:20:22):
permit systems have lower rates of child labor violations and
that when violations do happen, they are there's there's more
enforcement of those violations compared to states that do not
have them. And so we know of some recent
research on the protective effects of strong child Labor
Standards. And I think that is really just

(01:20:44):
evidence that we need to continue this work to strengthen
standards instead of weakening them.
Another audience question is what can workforce development
organizations, perhaps those particularly serving youth and
young adults, do to address address these issues?
And I take that one just real quick.

(01:21:06):
Our in Iowa, the Workforce Development Board, which I
missed that meeting because I was on jury duty doing my civic
anyway. And so I missed that they were
developing this bill. So let's start with can
workforce like ideas not actually include this at all and

(01:21:27):
not hide the stuff under work based learning and and not only
that, not give it kids any work comp or any way to to if they
are injured being trained or, orwork based learning or whatever
you want to call it. But actually I have seen around,
it's not just that like how can you be helpful?

(01:21:49):
Like don't come up with the bad ideas to begin with because this
workforce boards are where a lotof this crap starts.
That's what I've seen. Yeah, we, we saw a youth in
Washington state who lost parts of both of his legs in a
workforce learning program, student learner program.
So I really think it's inherent incumbent on these groups to to

(01:22:12):
not weaken safety protections toto enhance them really.
I mean, if they're they shouldn't be putting kids in
dangerous positions at all. I mean, it shouldn't be, it
shouldn't be an entryway for forhazardous work, so.
It's, I mean, one of the things that I'll say that we did to, we
advised our neighboring States and, and so on in the Midwest,

(01:22:36):
our counterparts at AFLCIO, whenyou have 50-60 years worth of
mishmash stuff put thrown together in code, it gives the
opposition a reason to say, hey,we need to quote UN quote, clean
this up, right? And then they go in and they
tweak it. And it's really not a tweak.

(01:22:57):
It's just terrible stuff, right?So try we, we've advised folks
to try and bring your standards up.
And Nina said you've been seeingthis, bring your standards up
and probably match FLSA as closeas you can because it if not be
safer, but match that because don't give somebody else the

(01:23:17):
opportunity to change a whole bunch of stuff.
And they even tried to do this and say, oh, well, we're the
heroes because we're cleaning upall.
There's some bad language around, you know, St. vendors
and stuff that doesn't even exist anymore.
So yeah, try and actually strengthen your laws.
But if take a look at the whole thing 'cause there's probably a
bunch of stuff in your code thatdoesn't even make sense anymore.

(01:23:44):
This is for a question for anyone.
What does a good job for a youthlook like and how do we start
building policies and practices to support that?
Well, I think, you know, on the hours front, I think, you know,
the federal standard of 18 hoursper week during the school week

(01:24:04):
is something to, to, to not makesure you do not exceed that.
You know, definitely don't go over 20.
But you know, that's, that's a real cause of concern.
And, you know, safety, safety consciousness is absolutely
critical. We've seen kids get hurt.
I saw a kid in talk to his parents in Wisconsin who was

(01:24:26):
working in a factory. His parents thought he was
sweeping the floor of this warehouse, but he ended up
losing half his hand when he moved over to a manufacturing
stamp metal stamping machine. And so it's, yeah, it's, you
know, safe, total safety conscious, hours restricted.

(01:24:47):
We don't want to see kids working past 7:00 PM on a school
night. Follow follow the federal law.
We're strong. And don't be trying to exploit
vulnerable teens and, and, and you know, and use them as a
cheap labor workforce. And then if I can add anything
to that. So I completely also agree with

(01:25:08):
Reed. I think also whenever we talk
like if we were to broaden it, Iwas like definitely thinking
about safety here, right? I was like, how come it was a
good job for youth? Well, you know, let's start off
with making sure that that placeis safe, making sure that you
know that they are fairly paid, making sure that they are
actually receiving skills and experience that can help
contribute to long term opportunities for youth.

(01:25:29):
You know, we need things that respect our time, respect our
dignity, respect our health. I was like, we need to stop
relying on a lot of child labor to fill in a lot of like the
systemic poverty that we know isthe root cause for why we see a
lot of child labor. I think one of the other things
that we also need is pathways. You know, we need something that
at the very end of the day ensures that families have the

(01:25:51):
ability to have economic stability to so that you don't
feel forced to work and can focus on learning and their
growth. I think that at the end of the
day that whenever we think of a vision, whenever we think about
the legacy that we want to build, whenever we think of, you
know, why people are here in the1st place, it is to create a

(01:26:12):
better future for their families.
School's their job. That's a lot.
You said it. A lot nicer.
You've seen. Yeah, but that's what I tell my
kids. It's like, you know what?
You get all this stuff for free and and it's from a very
privileged place. Look, I know not everybody's

(01:26:33):
there, but honestly the just having the ethos of like, OK,
your job is to do well in schooland finish school and that will
help you the rest of your life. That's the best youth job in my
opinion, is to focus on school. But again, that's a I don't

(01:26:54):
know, I'm a I'm a single dad white guy and I'm not in the
middle of a a lot of situations that a lot of other people are.
So it's easy for me to say that.But if you can, make school your
kids first job. Yeah, the key, the key there is
if you can, I don't disagree with that Charlie.
And again, unfortunately for farm workers or majority are

(01:27:17):
seasonal migrant workers and they they have to you know go
move with the crops and such. So they're schooling is, doesn't
have the luxury. I think those of us on this
panel I've had in our families. I, I, I just want to echo Reed
and Yesenia. You know, it starts with safety.
I think unfortunately we have to, we have to go with safety

(01:27:37):
here 1st. And, and that's, that's
something to where it's such a, the opportunities are there.
The opportunities, you know, at least from when we were all
growing up. And I'm going to, I'm speaking
in general terms, you know, I think you could say it was
fairly safe to be a paper board and deliver newspapers nowadays,
you know, that may not even be safe here.

(01:27:58):
So, so I think you really got tolook and, and, and start with
safety here. Well, thank you everyone.
This is such a massive topic andI'm sure we haven't touched on
so many things, but we really appreciate, you know, you all
taking the time and I'm going toturn it back over to Matt.

(01:28:23):
Thanks everyone. Thanks Yesenia, Charlie,
Christina, Ron, Reed and Nina for such a great conversation
and for covering so much ground on a on a really important and
timely topic. And thank you to all the
audience. I heard the chat was super
active. A lot of conversation going on
there, which is always great to great to great to see our, our

(01:28:48):
next event is going to be in January.
We're going to take December offto let our team rest a little
bit. So stay tuned For more
information about upcoming events and in this series and
our other series, Job Quality and practice.
A huge thank you to my team at the Economic Opportunities
program, including Max and Finney, who really led the

(01:29:08):
development of today's event, who did all the research behind
it, who found these amazing speakers that you all heard from
today. Special thanks also to Maureen
Conway, Cena and Colleen for their support and leadership on
this, as well as our comms team,Nora Francis and Tony and
architects for the production oftoday's event.
You know, we're wishing you all a safe and happy Thanksgiving

(01:29:30):
and we'll see you hopefully in in 2026.
But thank you again to our speakers and and you all for
joining us. We'll see you next time.

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