The Child Workforce

Working helps people provide the necessities of life for themselves and their loved ones. Across America and other countries, children are working at unlawful ages, and sometimes against their will. The way that children are exploited and work in unsafe conditions with low pay is a clear violation of human rights. Stronger, more concrete government laws and regulations need to be enforced to prevent child labor across the entire globe. Many countries do not have or do not enforce their labor laws. This leads to children working at young ages or illegally. In many countries, children are working who are below the legal working age of that country. Many jobs are not made for children, so when they work these jobs they have a high chance of getting very badly hurt. Factories are one of the many places where underage children are hired to work. Factory owners hire children to work at their factories because they can pay them less than an adult. The factory owners do not take into account that most of the machines that the children would be working at are made for adults to handle, not kids. Operating such machinery can cause major injuries to children who get their limbs stuck in the machine, and can even cause death. Many underage children that work do tedious and repetitive jobs such as: assembling boxes, polishing shoes, stocking store products or cleaning. In these jobs, children can be out of the sight of supervisors and can be taken advantage of easily. Whether it's working with no breaks, or receiving little to no pay, children get exploited because of where they are working. There are many reasons why children work. One main reason is that children who work underage grow up in poverty, and their families need all the money they can get. Thus, they send their children to find jobs, no matter what the job is, so that they can help keep the family fed and alive. Because these children are hidden when they work, officials cannot find them to help them and their families find a better life. Another type of job that many children find themselves doing is mining. Mining can bring in a lot of money in a little amount of time with just a little bit of luck. In many poverty stricken countries, mining can help families literally go from rags to riches. Finding even one small gem or stone can provide families with money for years to come. But because it is so hard to find gems, parents go on making a living doing whatever jobs they can find to provide food for the table, and then they send their children to go and try and find a gem. Because finding gems on your own without the proper equipment is extremely difficult, many children work for bigger companies who have the equipment. At these companies, many gems are found per day, and the children get a small portion of the gem payout. Working for these companies means working inside of the mines. The children dig out mine cart trails, go look for gems in small places, and sometimes even dive in underground lakes and rivers to scour the bottom for any signs of gems. Working in mines pose many health concerns to children. One health risk is that they can easily get killed or injured because of a mine collapsing. New York times writer Ammu Kannampilly reported on a thirteen year old Indian boy who worked in a coal mine. Kannampilly reports: “Thirteen-year-old Sanjay Chhetri has a recurring fear: that one day, the dark, dank mine where he works will cave in and bury him alive. Like thousands of children in India's remote northeast, Chhetri begins work in the middle of the night, ready to dig pits, squat through narrow tunnels and cut coal shards. At four feet six inches, the skinny teenager is the perfect fit for a job in the lucrative mining industry in Meghalaya state whose crudely-built rat-hole mines are too small for most adults to enter.” This quote shows how dangerous it is to mine as a child. Another way children are negatively affected by working