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Child Labor
Farm workers often begin to labor in the fields when they are very young. Four and five year old children can often be found picking crops alongside their parents and siblings. In the 1970s, investigations found thousands of children illegally employed in the fields during school hours. Currently, over 800,000 children perform agricultural work in this country.
Life is not easy for the children of many farm workers. They often work in the fields with their families and grow-up in a poor environment. As children of migrant workers, who move from job to job, their formal education is usually sporadic. Investigating teams from the American Friends Service Committee in the 1970s found children stooping in 100 degree heat for 10 hours a day to harvest crops. In other reports, children were known to work 6 days a week from 6:00 am to 5:00 p.m., with an hour for lunch.
While state and federal child labor laws regarding industrial labor are strictly enforced, agricultural child labor laws are often ignored.
For More Information about Child Labor:
- Child Labor Coalition
- Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights (formerly known as the National Labor Committee)
- One World
Child harvester, 1978 (Photo by Cathy Murphy)
Young girl working in the onion fields, 1976