Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children • Hacker News Board

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#91

Post by californiadreem » Fri, May 05, 2023, 5:49 PM UTC

sonofhans wrote: post #24

In 18th century London children were disposable labor: like cheaper, less durable horses. Children as young as 5 would work in match factories, dipping matchsticks into boiling sulfur by hand. Their lungs dissolved after a while, but then the factory owner didn’t pay their parents much for them anyway. Young children were the best chimney sweeps, too. London chimneys were a fucking mess, of course, built up rapidly a…

It's 2023, people, and I can't believe we're even having this debate. Seriously? Farmers working with their kids and teenagers learning trades is a clear violation of child labor laws. Kids need to be playing Fortnite and learning about baby sharks. And teenagers need to learn to spend their entire waking life indoors studying compliance with authority and status games, so corporations can have a steady supply of standardized and malleable human resources to draw from.

This isn't up for discussion. Period. Let that sink in: our society is allowing this local exploitation to continue, when that's the international market's job.

It's about time we take a stand against this blatant disregard for the law. I mean, it's plain and simple: we need to protect our children from being forced into labor by their families and local community members so that corporations can do it several years later, no questions asked. Do better, farmers and tradesmen – it's your responsibility to ensure your kids have a safe and happy childhood, locked inside public schools during business hours, not one filled with hands-on labor and universally in-demand skills.

No contest. When you involve your kids in farm or trade work, you're robbing them of their opportunity to be exploited down the line by Fortune 500 companies, and that's just unacceptable.

Hands down, we should be ashamed of ourselves for letting this happen in our own backyards. Full stop. It's high time we demand change, and make sure our children's rights are protected, no ifs, ands, or buts. They deserve the right to have a futile white-collar unionization fight with megafirms so that they can truly be a part of our global economy. To do anything else is retrograde barbarism. Period.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#92

Post by rhyn00 » Fri, May 05, 2023, 5:52 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #76

tasty_freeze wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The measure would permit children as young as 14 to work in roofing, construction and demolition, Those are comfy air conditioned office jobs.

Don't forget cleaning meat packing plants. Fucking cush jobs, amirite?

The bill explicitly states packing plants are not allowed.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#93

Post by rhyn00 » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:03 PM UTC

statop wrote: post #84

kasuki wrote: post #3

Laws that were intended to prevent children from working in dangerous factories should not apply to jobs in air conditioned offices.

If you took the time to read it, you would know that's not at all what this legislation is about. These regulations existed because children were exploited and taken advantage of in the past. [1] Would you care to inform us of the specific changes in Iowa that have now made "children working in dangerous conditions" no longer a concern? I'll provide a counterpoint now, you can just reply "sorry I was wrong". [2] just…

If you took time to read it you would find that meat packing and hazardous chemicals are still illegal under the new bill.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#94

Post by WillPostForFood » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:03 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #72

WillPostForFood wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The old law said, no one under 18 can work in a meat packing plant, the new law says no one under 18 can be a meat packer. It doesn't put teens to work at dangerous jobs, but allows them opportunity to work in those businesses.

> opportunity What an odd choice of wording - as if meat packing is some highly desirable industry that children are clamoring to get experience in (even as adults avoid it when they can).

To not consider work opportunity shows a highly elitist attitude. It is an opportunity to have money, to buy food, to help support family, to build a resume, to have peers. You might be too good for blue collar jobs, but they are in fact in demand by adults. 6 million adult have risked their lives and climbed over border fences for these jobs. Not everyone gets to go to Stanford a code for google, but honestly, if more bay area elite tech industry folks had a tough job in high school, they'd be better for it.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#95

Post by legitster » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:07 PM UTC

sonofhans wrote: post #24

In 18th century London children were disposable labor: like cheaper, less durable horses. Children as young as 5 would work in match factories, dipping matchsticks into boiling sulfur by hand. Their lungs dissolved after a while, but then the factory owner didn’t pay their parents much for them anyway. Young children were the best chimney sweeps, too. London chimneys were a fucking mess, of course, built up rapidly a…

There was that famous Unicef report about the child labor sweatshop in Bangladesh that closed down and most of the children went to work in the sex trade.

Regardless of how common that actually is, it seems pretty logical to me that if people are desperate enough for work, it's only because all of their other options were worse.

So while I think laws played an important part in ending chimney sweeps and the like, they only worked because enough middle class people started having fewer kids and enough resources to provide them education.

To put it another way, the need for chimney sweeping didn't magically disappear. First we had to build better chimneys.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#96

Post by red-iron-pine » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:07 PM UTC

DubiousPusher wrote: post #70

onetimeusename wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so is this an issue Iowans are concerned about or is this a synthetic issue that corporations are astroturfing? I can't see it being a very high priority imo even though I am sympathetic to 14 yr olds who want money.

I can't speak for Iowans but it looks very close to what has happened in my home state of Montana. That is, the Republican party has very successfully bonded a functional plurality to itself mostly via the culture war. In Montana this isn't just about your wedge issues like abortion. Particularly there's a long standing animice towards people who move there from California. This goes back to the 90s, long before it b…

> These people are so saturated with culture issues that they cannot see how the very thing they are in bond with, business, is destroying the things they claim to care most about: families, communities and generosity.

It's worth noting that's the whole point of these wars -- to keep people divided and riled up so they ignore other issues.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#97

Post by WillPostForFood » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:08 PM UTC

DubiousPusher wrote: post #35

WillPostForFood wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

16- and 17-year-olds can work and allows them to serve alcohol Teens don't really have smaller hands than adults. This bill is sane. Allowing kids to work for construction is going to improve lives more than blindly pushing everyone regardless of desire or aptitude in college and graduating them with a worthless degree and a half mil in debt. Let teens work in roofing and get some skills that the world actually needs…

Here's a rational argument. Roofing in particular is one of the most dangerous, demanding and environmentally harsh trades in the construction industry. Just as there is an age below which most children's bodies are not ready to begin heavy weight lifting, there is an age below which most children's bodies are not prepared to handle roofing.

The bill blocks all children from working on roofs, it just allows 17 and 18 year olds to work for roofing companies in other capacities. Prior to this amendment, roofing companies could do no hiring in any capacity. Does the bill seem more reasonable now?

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#98

Post by WillPostForFood » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:09 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #66

dragonwriter wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which we're disregarding here; people should be fine making whatever stupid decision they want The entire reason the concept of “minors” exists is a social judgement that this rule has only limited applicability to people below a certain age.

A country that allows kids to climb on roofs five years before they're considered mature enough to drink alcohol needs to have another look at how it does risk assessment.

The bill bans children from working on roofs, it just allows them to work for roofing capacities.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#99

Post by red-iron-pine » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:09 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #34

WillPostForFood wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

16- and 17-year-olds can work and allows them to serve alcohol Teens don't really have smaller hands than adults. This bill is sane. Allowing kids to work for construction is going to improve lives more than blindly pushing everyone regardless of desire or aptitude in college and graduating them with a worthless degree and a half mil in debt. Let teens work in roofing and get some skills that the world actually needs…

I do not believe any rational argument will appease. Risk can be objectively measured but people vote their feelings. This bill is being used to avoid raising wages to draw adult labor into the state's marketplace for manufacturing, agriculture, and other objectively higher risk industries. These young workers will be harmed, and they will have no recourse (as typically happens in America).

> Risk can be objectively measured but people vote their feelings

Having done cybersecurtity at a few F500s, I can tell you that risk is often just as "feelings" based as anything else.

In most cases risk is a WAG based on whatever model you feel like flogging this week.

Re: Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children

#100

Post by Izkata » Fri, May 05, 2023, 6:13 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #60

ejb999 wrote: post #49

I worked in heavy construction and roofing from 14 until I went to college - helped paid for quite a bit of it - I don't see a problem here. Nobody is forced to work, and you need to parents permission. Washington post thinks it is OK that 12 year olds, are old enough to consent to sex change operations, without their parents permission, but a 17 year old doing hard work with their parents permission is not OK?

> consent to sex change operations, without their parents permission This doesn't happen and the news sources which say it does are lying to you.

Oregon House Bill 2002 B hasn't passed yet, and sets the age limit at 15 instead of 12, but the rest is accurate - it's not only without their parents' consent, it includes hiding it from the parents. I wouldn't be surprised if there is one that fits their whole description.