[green_man_lives]

It is clear that many aren't reading the article. This is not about kids working at McDonald's for a summer job:

"In February, the Labor Department announced that it had found more than a hundred children between the ages of thirteen and seventeen working in meatpacking plants and slaughterhouses, in eight states, for Packers Sanitation Services, one of the nation’s largest food-sanitation companies. The facilities themselves are owned by major corporations, including Tyson Foods and JBS. (All three companies denied that they had engaged in any wrongdoing.) The children worked overnight shifts at such jobs as cleaning bone saws and head splitters with hazardous chemicals. At least three were injured."

[NickBusey]

The amount of “pro child labor” comments in this thread is truly disheartening.

[l3mure]

Extremely on brand for HN, there's always a notable contingent in these kinds of threads.

[libraryatnight]

There's a lot of people here who forgot what they were before the internet made them comfortable livings, and then a bunch more that are MBA types willing to say anything that makes money makes sense

[codegeek]

As a parent, I am watching the latest generation of kids where they are struggling to find meaningful work because some of them never worked a day in their life. I want to avoid that situation. I obviously am not advocating for child labor in a meat packing plant working night shifts around dangerous tools and machinery.

[mmarq]

I “never worked a day in my life” until I turned 19 and found my first job. You don’t need to work in you mid teens to find a meaningful job as an adult.

[mathgladiator]

I was raking leaves when I was 13, and I started freelancing 15...

Why? Well, it started because I wanted to play Mario Kart on Super Nintendo...

There is something about developing a work ethic as a young person that is important. It starts with chores like mowing the yard.

[xracy]

There's nothing that says you can't develop this without depending on child labor.

I work hard, and my first job was when I was 18. Nothing about a work ethic is special to working hard in a job. Some of the most impressive people I work with had really impressive school work ethics.

[bko]

It's not just about work ethic. It's about social skills. I worked as a lifeguard for 6 years and the amount of skills I picked up from socializing with the parents and children really helped me out. I probably learned a lot more from that job than I did at school. I learned things about psychology and raising children as I saw a lot of parents with different styles and got to follow their kids as they grew up. I learned about responsibility and showing up on time. I learned how to manage money. And probably most importantly I learned how to talk to adults. It was my most rewarding and fond memory of my childhood.

The alternative life path was basically me staying at home for hours playing Diablo 2.

[anonymouskimmer]

> There is something about developing a work ethic as a young person that is important.

I started delivering newspapers when I was 10. Dropped out of college and was somewhat depressed with a series of menial jobs. Eventually got on track again, got an A.S. and got a job in the industry I wanted to be in. But it was a low level job that left me very little autonomy and didn't tax my intelligence.

At some point I just stopped caring. A "work ethic" can be killed. Or can devolve into a "money" ethic where people play the kinds of financial engineering games that led to the 2008 recession.

I care again, but only because I'm not doing a menial job anymore.

[mathgladiator]

For context, I was 13 walking door to door asking neighbors if I could rake their yards. Fall was money. Same thing in winter with shoveling snow.

[codegeek]

You seem to get my argument. It is about helping your child develop good "Work Ethics" which unfortunately these days is equated to being exploited if you dare to bring it up.

[mmarq]

That’s not true at all. People work much harder than in the past, especially considering what they get back. 20-30 year olds are the first generation in almost a century that give away half of their waking hours and struggle to get decent housing.

Rates of unionisation are extremely low, strikes are extremely rare (it took a 30% real income loss before junior doctors started striking in the UK), employment rates are the highest throughout the world and unpaid overtime is the norm in almost all careers.

[jakelazaroff]

What exactly is important about it?

[mathgladiator]

Things have to get done.

I own a house. Some time ago, my plumbing had issues. I had to go down into my basement and deal with shit. Literal shit. Work ethic is what lets you put on the "I got things to do" hat, and then you do them.

That's just life. Life is hard and brutal requiring constant effort.

[codegeek]

Respectfully, I wouldn't want my kid to wait till 19 to do that. I want them to get a job the moment they turn 14-15 (whatever the legal age is in my state). I am very privileged and want my kids to learn the value of money and what it takes to survive in the real world. I want them to work in a dirty shitty McDonalds where they see how tough the real world is. Yes I wouldn't send them to a meat packing plant but there is big difference between never working or just working cool summer jobs and working in a meat factory. I want my kids to experience some hardship where your boss is yelling at you to get shit done. As long as it is not full abuse. I want my kids to learn that the World is not rainbow and sunshines from an early age. I still love them to death and would die for them.

[jakelazaroff]

I truly don’t understand the mindset that suffering is not only something that we should not try to eliminate, but something that we should actually indoctrinate people into.

[mathgladiator]

The truth is that we haven't solved automated all the jobs that require suffering.

With the worry about AI, I was staring at my plumbing stack the other day for hours... Realizing, this is a shit job in the truest form, and I couldn't figure out how a machine could do it.

The reason to understand the suffering, to indoctrinate people as you say, is to teach people to respect those that have these jobs. Life is hard, and we are in it together.

[BasedAnon]

Why do you think work a worse fate than school? At least with work you get paid for your time and effort, and get the chance to network with people older than yourself

[NickBusey]

> I want my kids to experience some hardship where your boss is yelling at you to get shit done

This is a horrendous take, and I’m glad you’re not my parent.

They’ll learn the world isn’t rainbows and sunshine without being in a toxic work environment before they’re even old enough to vote.

[codegeek]

See, that's where I disagree where a tough boss is considered "toxic" nowadays.

[austhrow743]

Why is a dirty shitty McDonalds more real world than an upbringing where you didn't arbitrarily force that on them?

[mmarq]

If I want my child to learn anything about bosses that shout, is that you don’t let anybody shout at you.

[libraryatnight]

You're willing to come into a thread as a parent making comments in defense of child labor (your note saying you're not advocating it is at odds with your comment and irrelevant),based on your myopic generalization of a generation. Youve got cranky old person brain and are flirting with dangerous solutions. a pitty

[codegeek]

I am not advocating for Child Labor. Putting a 15 year old in a Meat Packing plant working night shifts is wrong. I would never advocate for that. But I wanted to highlight that we have gone in the other direction too much as a culture where kids are over protected and we no longer teach them work ethics at an early age and that creates problems when many of them get out there in the real world after 18. I have seen many in my own friends/family and I refuse to let my kids go through the same.

[libraryatnight]

Your feeling about what direction you think anything is going is irrelevant and again limited, it's a personal insecurity it has no place here in a thread discussing an article describing what you claim to know is wrong while sewing some doubt that it's wrong because of anecdotal anxiety

[cafard]

My grandfather thought that his sons, college-bound as they were, should experience manual labor. For my father, it was a county road crew one summer, for his younger brother a stint or two as a railroad track worker. Sometime after their days with shovels, they sat down and reviewed the old man's chronology. He had never done paid manual labor, had gone right from a commercial high school to an office. He admitted this, saying that he thought that it would be good for them.

But a) these were his sons, big strapping guys of seventeen or so, and b) they were not in especially hazardous conditions. The people who think it is well for other people's adolescents to do dangerous work, I don't understand.

[green_man_lives]

Funny, my grandfather worked in agriculture since he was 5 by his own account. He is the hardest working man I know, but I never heard him say anything about the value of a hard day's work. Instead he told me how important an education was and how I should always work smarter and not harder.

[seanmcdirmid]

> The amount of “pro child labor” comments in this thread is truly disheartening.

Why is there no nuance between "let the kids do safe jobs if they want" and "make the kids do dangerous jobs" positions? I guess you are either for it all or against any of it?

[green_man_lives]

Because the article is about the exploitation of migrant children in dangerous industries and people are commenting with pro child-labor takes citing their summer job in high school. It's

1. An unproductive shift from the actual topic.

2. Clear they didn't bother reading the article.

I don't think anyone has an issue with teenagers working at McDonald's, although I think they should be taught about labor protections first to avoid being exploited by a megalomaniac store manager. Which is a common occurrence since teenagers don't know any better.

[lowbloodsugar]

There is a war going on, and HN is influential enough that it warrants propaganda.

[green_man_lives]

I have felt that way for a while. It seems like a place where propaganda would have a very good ROI. I see fewer and fewer tech articles on here and more and more "culture war" stuff. But I have only been active about 2 years. I'd like to know if the vibe was different before.

[BasedAnon]

why? Do you have any idea how many of them would be in a significantly better place financially by their 20s instead of being in debt?

[bko]

Keep reading. The next paragraph:

> It was clear, in any case, from a range of reports, that they were all, or nearly all, drawn from the great underage labor pool of children who have crossed the border in recent years. “Unaccompanied minors” who arrive from non-neighboring countries—which, in effect, means Central America—are permitted to remain in the U.S. and are remanded to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services, which delivers them as quickly as possible to a sponsor while asylum applications are processed. The asylum processing typically takes years.

The problem seems to be driven by undocumented workers crossing the border. There are a lot of dangerous second order effects from having a porous border and this is one of them.

It's also interesting how they talk about it. "crossed the border". You won't find Mexico, undocumented or migrant in the rest of the text. Without a careful reading you'd think these are lower middle class American's sending their children to coal mines because free school lunch plans were cut due to austerity. There is only one mention of "the border" in the last paragraph:

> Republicans say that the problem is an insecure border.

[green_man_lives]

> Keep reading.

I did.

> The problem seems to be driven by undocumented workers crossing the border. There are a lot of dangerous second order effects from having a porous border and this is one of them.

Ok? They are still children. Child exploitation is not an immediate downstream effect of having illegal immigration. It is a downstream effect of having an exploitative system.

> It's also interesting how they talk about it. "crossed the border". You won't find Mexico, undocumented or migrant in the rest of the text.

Yeah probably because the exploitation of children is much more disconcerting than people overstaying their visas or escaping violence. I think the only benefit that the added context would be to segue into arguing for stronger protections for undocumented laborers.

> Without a careful reading you'd think these are lower middle class American's sending their children to coal mines

Again, I don't care if it is undocumented migrant children or middle class Americans. I don't understand why you think this context would change the impression the article is going to give on readers.

I feel like the point you are trying to make is that "It's only the exploitation of people who came here illegally, so it's no big deal."

[bko]

> Child exploitation is not an immediate downstream effect of having illegal immigration. It is a downstream effect of having an exploitative system.

I disagree. You have people outside of the system. It's hard to pass a law that protects these people because they are outside of the legal system by being undocumented

> people overstaying their visas or escaping violence.

Most of the people that are caught up in this situation came without a visa so please don't conflate the two.

> I feel like the point you are trying to make is that "It's only the exploitation of people who came here illegally, so it's no big deal."

Quite the opposite. I'm saying that pretending like having open borders and having all these undocumented workers and turning the blind eye necessary leads to exploration. And this includes exploitation of children. It's not humane to just pretend there isn't a problem. This is the same logic that thinks it's compassionate to let mentally ill people sleep on the streets and self medicate

[giraffe_lady]

They aren't outside of the legal system, labor laws don't discriminate by immigration status. They know that if they seek redress under those laws, they will be punished under others.

The system prioritizes immigration enforcement over the rights & safety of workers and children. The system chooses not to protect them. Other choices are possible here don't pretend this is the inevitable & only outcome there could be.

For example we could easily give temporary immigration amnesty to victims of alleged crimes. Instead we have ICE camped out at family court, companies like this using the threat of deportation to keep their exploited workers in line. To the point of using child labor. Look at what you are defending here.

[green_man_lives]

Couldn't have said it better.

[anonymouskimmer]

You quoted earlier: "are permitted to remain in the U.S. and are remanded to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services, which delivers them as quickly as possible to a sponsor"

Which means that they are not "outside of the system", and not without documentation (as minor-aged asylum seekers).

[green_man_lives]

> It's hard to pass a law that protects these people because they are outside of the legal system by being undocumented

It's really not. Don't deport people who file labor complaints. You can protect undocumented workers quite easily.

> Most of the people that are caught up in this situation came without a visa so please don't conflate the two.

I don't care if they came without a visa or overstayed a visa or literally walked across the border. I think borders are arbitrary and see very little difference anyways.

> I'm saying that pretending like having open borders and having all these undocumented workers and turning the blind eye necessary leads to exploration.

You are claiming something to be inherent when it is not. Illegal immigration does not create exploitation. Threat of deportation creates exploitation. If the threat of employer retaliation didn't exist, if illegal immigrants were educated about our labor laws, there would not be as much exploitation. It's really simple, I feel that you are being obtuse.

> This is the same logic that thinks it's compassionate to let mentally ill people sleep on the streets and self medicate

Nobody thinks it is compassionate to "let" people live on the streets, they just don't think cops should forcibly remove the homeless. Compassion would be giving them housing and treatment, but you wont see many "liberals" supporting free no strings attached housing.

If by self-medicating you mean harm reduction by giving opioid addicts heroin then I wouldn't say that is compassionate, just the bare minimum. When the alternative is them overdosing on fent or dying from withdrawals.

I think you haven't really thought very hard about these things because your arguments are very tired and simplistic. The answer is not more cruelty, nor is it the half-measures you see in San Francisco or Seattle or whatever. The policy solutions are pretty simple and are supported by empirical evidence in many countries and case studies.

[lisasays]

The problem seems to be driven by undocumented workers crossing the border.

No, as always (and from basic physic, as it were): what it's driven by is greed, and a lack of oversight. And to some extent, it may be a negative side effect of the rising minimum wage in some states. The undocumented workers, are just following the path of least resistance -- and are getting sucked in over the border, in response to these forces.

Remember, by themselves they are essentially powerless -- and the very opposite of a "driving force" for anything in this picture,

[lisasays]

"basic physics"

[maxerickson]

Why the blame the kids and not the companies?

Like how was it easily determined that these children working for this company were working without permits?

[JakeAl]

You left out the part where the government is trafficking them to the "sponsors."

[maxerickson]

Wouldn't regulating the companies protect the children from the harsh environments regardless of the intentions of their sponsors?

[koboll]

A little misleading, perhaps, that at the top of the article is an illustration of a kid working at McDonald's.

[chasd00]

> with hazardous chemicals. At least three were injured.

Windex is a hazardous chemical and scratching yourself on a bandsaw is an injury. Needs more details.

[green_man_lives]

What an argument in bad faith. You are being extremely reductive in order to glaze over the litany of other issues here.

Minors should not be cleaning dangerous equipment in slaughterhouses. Not to mention the lack of labor protections, blatant disregard for existing labor laws, the fact that most of the children are undocumented... need I go on?

[zamalek]

And I was called out for a slippery alope argument when critiquing loosening child labor laws (https://apnews.com/article/child-labor-laws-alabama-ohio-c11...). Seems like we are at the bottom of the slope already.

Either way, disregard for child labor law might not be happening in some of these cases.

[lozenge]

I'm going to guess the companies that are willing to employ kids are not going to report when said child grazes their knee.

[grumple]

You say that like you can't cut off a limb with a bandsaw! [0]

> The accident summaries from 2021 to 2023 show that most injuries involve hands and fingers. While some are only cuts and lacerations, most incidents proceed to partial and full finger amputations.

My guess is that minor injuries usually go unreported.

0. https://www.sawinery.net/bandsaw-accidents/#:~:text=Even%20t....

[jonfw]

These kids are cleaning bandsaw blades, not making furniture with them

[klyrs]

Best quote from that page

> No matter what you’ll use the bandsaw for, loose clothing and pieces of jewelry should be part of your work attire.

[jstanley]

You can cut off a limb with a bandsaw, but scratching yourself and cutting off a limb are different injuries.