"We have been tracking for a couple of years now the alarming trend that there are several states across the country that have actively been attempting to weaken child labor protections just at the same time as violations of child labor standards nationally have been on the rise over the last decade," Sherer said in a phone interview with WVIK. "And digging into this, it's very clear that what's behind this is a coordinated multi-industry attempt to weaken child labor standards and expand employer access to low-wage labor essentially."
Illinois AFL-CIO President Tim Drea says kids should be in the classroom not the workforce.
"I'm (going) to call them student workers, a very, very exploitive population," Drea said in a phone interview with WVIK. "It doesn't make sense that student workers work past 9 pm. It doesn't make sense that kids should be working more than 20 hours a week."
Drea and Sherer both point to Iowa as going in the wrong direction.
"Iowa has passed the most extreme legislation of any state in the country on child labor in the past year. Opening up hazardous jobs," Sherer said. "Things like allowing employers to put 14-year-olds to work in industrial laundry, 15-year-olds on assembly lines, requesting state waivers to hire 16-year-olds to work in the most hazardous jobs, so that's things like demolition, roofing, excavation... a long list of federally prohibited occupations for children under 18."
She also mentions the state's change allowing teens aged 16 to serve alcohol and increasing hours so children as young as 14 work up to six-hour shifts on school nights.
"That's despite research that has documented for a long time that when young teens work over 20 hours a week, it starts to affect their academic progress and their grades," Sherer said.
Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds released an open letter on Monday, July 1st, calling for the Department of Labor to stop its "crusade" fining Iowa businesses using child labor.
Governor Reynolds says, "...The Department of Labor seems to think kids who work are likely more oppressed than they are empowered. What to most Iowans looks like a sensible option for kids is being treated as a sinister plot to force children back into the sweatshops, mines, and factories of the late 1800s. The needs and challenges of today's workforce have changed. Yet, the department holds tight to outdated rules for problems that no longer exist."
"We've had documented cases of meatpacking companies in Iowa with teenagers on overnight sanitation crews that the DOL has had to investigate and fight in the past year," Sherer said. "I think those claims are a little bit hollow."
Sherer says before last year, Iowa and other states allowed teenagers aged 14 and up to work age-appropriate jobs while being able to finish high school.
"(Iowa) state legislature passed a law that they knew is directly contradicting federal law are doing so pretty boldy and then claiming that the federal guidelines not only shouldn't apply to Iowa businesses but should be eradicated," Sherer said. "Really taking us back to those early 20th century debates about whether we're going to have a society where all kids, no matter their background or income level have a right to safe age-appropriate work and a quality education to set them up for the rest of their lives."
Drea mentions the long history of addressing child labor in America with the Keating-Owen Child Labor Act of 1916, which the U.S. Supreme Court struck down. It wasn't until 1938, with the Fair Labor Standards Act, that child workers were protected.
He says Iowa's new child labor law moved Illinois to modernize its old statute.
"Working with the Illinois Department of Labor that we would delete the old law and wrote one that's good for the 21st century that was very clear and unambiguous that employers need to follow these laws to make sure kids are protected in the workplace."
The new Illinois law requires teens under 16 to receive a work permit and submit it to their employer. During the summer, teens can work eight hours a day, equaling 48 hours a week. During school, teens can work three hours a day up to 24 hours a week and not past 7 p.m. unless they are employed in recreational or educational activities by a park district or municipal parks and recreation departments, where it remains three hours a day twice a week until 9 p.m.
Sherer mentions mudding the waters of work permits only hurts employees and employers.
"States like Iowa, Arkansas, and others who in the past couple of years removed their work permit systems are often leaving people in the dark," Sherer said. "If you don't have to get that piece of paper upfront or get that reminder, you must find that information yourself. It's still out there. But one of those challenges that businesses are facing in Iowa right now, and why so many of them are shocked to find out they are in violation of federal law, is that the state stopped informing people of the accurate information.
"So there is no more permitting system that gives people that information upfront and even worse, on the state's website, they have taken out the information of the federal guidelines, so employers are misinformed by the governor and the state and put them in hot water with legal trouble that they shouldn't have to be dealing with now."
Just this year, the Department of Labor has conducted investigations across the country and has found child labor violations in many states, including California, Utah, Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, New York, Alabama, Iowa, New Hampshire, Maryland, Idaho, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, with ongoing investigations in several other states, according to Deputy Director for Public Affairs at the Department of Labor Midwest Region Rhonda Burke.
You can find more information on child labor laws by visiting the Department of Labor's website.
