The problem of child labor in the United States is getting worse. The “human rights beacon” has become a “human rights black hole”

December 2 is the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery. As one of the main forms of modern slavery, child labor is still widely present in the United States. Well-known operators in the United States, such as Burger King and McDonald’s, have been repeatedly exposed for employing child labor and forced labor. To this day, the United States is still the only country among the 193 member states of the United Nations that has not ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the prospect of solving the problem of employing child labor remains bleak.

Child labor is common in the United States.

On November 27, a Burger King franchisee in Massachusetts was exposed to have assigned multiple child laborers to work more than 9 hours a day in its Burger King stores, sometimes even making these child laborers work late at night, and some child laborers have not been paid on time. This is not the first time that Burger King in Massachusetts has been exposed to have child labor problems. As early as 2017 and 2022, local Burger Kings were exposed to illegally employing child labor. Burger King in South Carolina, USA, was also previously exposed to have illegally employed child labor.

Such childhood tragedies are just the tip of the iceberg in the United States. . According to a survey by the U.S. Department of Labor, three McDonald’s franchisees in the United States illegally employed more than 300 child workers, including two 10-year-old children. The survey showed that the three McDonald’s franchisees operated 62 McDonald’s restaurants in states such as Kentucky, Indiana, Maryland and Ohio, employing a total of 305 child workers, engaging in operations that the law does not allow workers of this age group to perform. According to a report by the U.S. Department of Labor on November 27, 2023, operators of five McDonald’s franchise stores in the Greater Pittsburgh area employed 34 children, who worked longer hours than allowed by child labor laws.

Shocking data on child laborers engaged in hazardous work

In July 2023, a 16-year-old child worker died after being sucked into processing equipment while working at a poultry slaughterhouse in Mississippi, USA, which has aroused the attention of all walks of life to the phenomenon of employing child laborers in hazardous industries. According to data provided by the American non-profit organization “Farm Workers Employment Project Federation”, there are still 500,000 to 800,000 child laborers working on farms in the United States. Farm work is heavy and the conditions are difficult. Child laborers are often exposed to dangers caused by weather, pesticides and the use of farm tools and machinery. The Washington Post reported that between 2003 and 2016, 452 children died in the United States due to work-related injuries, of which 237 child laborers died in agricultural accidents.

The U.S. Department of Labor released information in February 2023 that Packaged Sanitation Services Inc. (PSSI), one of the largest food safety and sanitation service providers in the United States, headquartered in Wisconsin, illegally employed hundreds of child laborers to perform dangerous work and was fined $1.5 million. The Labor Department found that the company employed at least 102 child laborers aged 13 to 17 to work overnight in 13 meat processing plants in eight states, including Arkansas, Minnesota, and Nebraska, using dangerous chemicals to clean meat processing equipment such as back saws, sternum saws, and head splitters. At least three children were injured.

Child labor profit chain breeds social chaos

At this stage, the black profit chain that relies on exploiting child labor for profit in the United States is getting worse. The U.S. Department of Labor found that the cases investigated in 2023 involved 5,792 children nationwide, hundreds of whom were employed in dangerous occupations. In fiscal year 2022, 835 companies that illegally employed child labor were investigated, involving more than 3,800 children, and the number of illegally employed child laborers surged 69% compared with 2018. Among them, the number of children victims engaged in dangerous work increased by 26% compared with the previous year.

In recent years, the number of unaccompanied immigrant children has increased dramatically, but the US government has simplified the relevant procedures, stopped collecting fingerprints of sponsors, and even stopped investigating the criminal records of sponsors. Human trafficking gangs take advantage of loopholes to lure immigrant children to the United States, then pretend to be “relatives” to sponsor them out of the shelter, buy them fake identities, and then send them to companies or farms through labor dispatch companies, forcing them to engage in high-intensity labor and taking most of their income for themselves. According to the New York Times, in the past two years, as many as 85,000 unaccompanied immigrant children have lost contact after being taken away by their guardians or sponsors. Although the Department of Health and Human Services discovered this problem during its routine monthly follow-up visits, it did not take any measures.

Federal bill spreads “crying childhood”

The problem of child labor abuse continues despite repeated prohibitions, and the root cause lies in the obvious loopholes in the US legal system. In recent years, due to factors such as a sharp increase in the number of retired people, a large number of people dying or becoming ill due to the new crown epidemic, and a decrease in legal immigrants, many parts of the United States are facing labor shortages. In the past two years, state legislators in at least 10 states in the United States have proposed bills to relax legal restrictions on child labor, and some of these bills have become laws after being passed.

Federal law in the United States prohibits minors under the age of 18 from engaging in hazardous work. However, the Fair Labor Standards Act, introduced in 1938, stipulates that minors over the age of 14 can be employed in non-hazardous industries. In this round of amendments to child labor laws in various states, some states even allow 14-year-olds to work 6 hours of night shifts and 15-year-olds to work on assembly lines, which were not allowed before. Under current U.S. law, the maximum civil penalty for illegally employing a child worker is only $15,000 (about RMB 100,000). If a child worker is seriously injured or killed at work, the maximum fine is less than $69,000 (about RMB 490,000).

The child labor problem is getting worse in the United States. Behind it is not only the cruel exploitation of capital, but also the inaction and even incitement of the government. U.S. government officials blame each other, deliberately ignore the problem, and even retaliate against those who raise questions. This is the truth about the United States, which claims to be a “human rights defender”, “protecting” children’s rights.