No, child labor laws should not be amended.
Story in today's WaPo that a think tank and bill-mill in Florida, the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA) is responsible for drafting the laws now being passed in certain states. It's one of many bill-mills pumping out draft legislation for submission to state legislatures for action. They always give these creepy outfits names designed to invoke a positive image while in reality their aims are quite negative and designed to benefit certain interests.
Excerpts:
"The Florida-based think tank and its lobbying arm, the Opportunity Solutions Project, have found remarkable success among Republicans to relax regulations that prevent children from working long hours in dangerous conditions.
The FGA achieved its biggest victory in March, playing a central role in designing a new Arkansas law to eliminate work permits and age verification for workers younger than 16. Its sponsor, state Rep. Rebecca Burkes (R), said in a hearing that the legislation “came to me from the Foundation [for] Government Accountability.”
“As a practical matter, this is likely to make it even harder for the state to enforce our own child labor laws,” said Annie B. Smith, director of the University of Arkansas School of Law’s Human Trafficking Clinic. “Not knowing where young kids are working makes it harder for [state departments] to do proactive investigations and visit workplaces where they know that employment is happening to make sure that kids are safe.”
That law passed so swiftly and was met with such public outcry that Arkansas officials quickly approved a second measure increasing penalties on violators of the child labor codes the state had just weakened."
That last sentence is our welcome to the world of down is up, wrong is right, black is white and I've no doubt that more craziness is being drafted for the next set of acts to degrade long-standing safeguards in many areas. This is the GOP agenda of Steve Bannon and his ilk to "dismantle the administrative state." We've seen this in the weakening of safety standards for railroad freight cars, banking regulations, etc, and now we're seeing it in the meat packing industry which has been a perennial violator of safety and quality norms.
The WaPo story is illustrated by a photo of a Federal official at, you guessed it,
a meat packing plant which is no place for a mid-teen to work, especially an immigrant teen who arrived here without his or her parents. Would you want your mid-teen child farmed out to uncaring middlemen who provide vulnerable youths to dangerous industries?
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