child labor

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For These Kids, Toiling in Illegal Mines Is 'Only Option'

Lithium demand creates 'new frontier for mining' in Nigeria, with children doing much of the work

(Newser) - Dressed in a faded pink dress, 6-year-old Juliet Samaniya squats under scorching skies to chip at a jagged white rock with a stone tool. Dust coats her tiny hands and her hair as she works hour after hour, for less than a dollar a day in Nasarawa, Nigeria. The landscape...

Company That Hired Kids for Slaughterhouse Jobs Fined

They worked shifts cleaning equipment on the 'kill floor' at Iowa pork plant

(Newser) - A company that hired children for dangerous jobs in an Iowa slaughterhouse, including cleaning equipment on the "kill floor" corrosive chemicals, has been fined almost $172,000. The Department of Labor said that between 2019 and 2023, 11 underage workers were hired to clean "head splitters, jaw pullers,...

Girl Worked 60-Hour Weeks Making Parts for Hyundai: Feds

Lawsuit claims car maker, a subsidiary, and a staffing agency profited illegally in Alabama

(Newser) - She worked up to 60 hours a week making car parts for Hyundai. According to the feds, she was just 13. The Labor Department sued Hyundai on Thursday, accusing the company of using child labor at the SMART Alabama factory in Luverne, which supplies parts for Hyundai's assembly line...

Sanitation Firm Fined $650K for Hiring Kids to Clean Factories

Fayette Janitorial Service has also agreed to no longer hire minors to work in meatpacking plants

(Newser) - A Tennessee-based sanitation company has agreed to pay more than half a million dollars after a federal investigation found it illegally hired at least two dozen children to clean dangerous meat-processing facilities in Iowa and Virginia. The US Department of Labor announced Monday that Fayette Janitorial Service LLC entered into...

Feds Say Company Hired Kids to Clean 'Kill Floor Equipment'

Some illegally hired workers at slaughterhouses were just 13 years old, Labor Department says

(Newser) - Federal law bans people under 18 from working in slaughterhouses because of the dangers involved, but a Tennessee-based company hired kids as young as 13 to clean plants in Virginia and Iowa, the Labor Department says. "Minors were used to clean dangerous kill floor equipment such as head splitters,...

Children Are Working on Our Roofs—and Falling From Them

The 'New York Times' speaks with migrant children who work as roofers

(Newser) - In the US, you have to be 18 to work as a roofer due to the inherent danger of the job. But as the New York Times reports in a grim investigation, a growing population of children are ending up on our roofs anyway, in some cases without safety gear...

Investigation Lobs Disturbing Allegations Against Candy Giant

CBS News finds Mars uses chocolate harvested by kids as young as 5

(Newser) - A CBS News investigation finds that candy company Mars, Inc. continues to use cocoa harvested by child laborers in Africa, and calls into question the company's stated commitment to keeping kids there in school. The media outlet found kids as young as five working at each of the cocoa...

Feds Fine Company That Employed 11-Year-Old Forklift Operator

Kentucky distribution center had child workers for months, Department of Labor says

(Newser) - A warehouse in Kentucky that employed two children, including an 11-year-old who operated a forklift, has been fined $30,276 and ordered to stop hiring underage workers. The US Department of Labor says the children were employed at the Win.It America Inc. for months before the labor law violation...

'Open Secret' at Chicken Slaughterhouses: Kids at Work

Hannah Dreier reports on it for 'New York Times Magazine'

(Newser) - He was, according to his hospital paperwork, a 20-year-old man named Francisco. But hospital staffers in rural Virginia were perplexed because the patient in front of them—his arm nearly severed in a gruesome accident at a chicken slaughterhouse—was clearly just a kid. Investigative reporter Hannah Dreier explains the...

Labor Shortage Means This Group Is in Demand for Summer Jobs

Teens are in the driver's seat, with the ability to hold out for jobs with higher wages

(Newser) - Teens have long been vital to filling out the summertime staffs of restaurants, ice cream stands, amusement parks, and camps. Now, thanks to one of the tightest labor markets in decades, they have even more sway, with an array of jobs to choose from at ever higher wages, per the...

New Labor Law in This State Lets Kids Work Longer Hours

Iowa GOP pushes through child labor legislation that even lets minors serve booze in some cases

(Newser) - Every Democrat in Iowa's Senate, as well as two Republicans, voted nay on a controversial bill early Tuesday that would allow teens to work longer hours in currently banned jobs, including in roles that serve booze. But the rest of the body's GOP pushed the legislation through by...

DOL: Firm Hired Kids to Work Overnight Shifts in Risky Jobs

Packers Sanitation Services hit with $1.5M fine for allegedly hiring minors to clean meatpacking plants

(Newser) - The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 bars all minors from working with certain hazardous equipment; prohibits kids who are 14 and 15 from working past 7pm, or for more than three hours a day; and mandates that children under the age of 14 can't work at all. Now,...

Reuters: Hyundai Subsidiary in Alabama Used Child Labor

Insiders say siblings ages 12, 13, and 15 were among numerous underage workers

(Newser) - The use of child labor in dangerous factories isn't a thing of the past, or a thing that only happens in other countries, according to a Reuters report on a Hyundai subsidiary in Alabama. Reuters says that after a 13-year-old Guatemalan girl disappeared from her family's home earlier...

Singer's 4-Year-Old Performed With Him. Now, a $3.6K Fine

Germany's Angelo Kelly is accused of violating child labor laws

(Newser) - A Bavarian court found a folk singer guilty Friday of violating Germany's strict child-labor laws for having his 4-year-old son perform onstage with him during an evening concert. Angelo Kelly, 39, was fined $3,600 by the Hassfurt administrative court for the 2019 appearance at an open-air summer concert...

Clooney Reacts to Nespresso-Linked Child Labor Exposé

'Clearly this board and this company still have work to do. And that work will be done'

(Newser) - George Clooney has been Nespresso's brand ambassador since 2006, but after an investigation claimed to find six of the company's Guatemalan coffee suppliers use child labor, the actor is expressing regret. Per Deadline and CNN , he says he joined Nespresso's sustainability advisory board seven years ago (along...

Chipotle Must Pay $1.3M Over Child Labor Violations

They occurred at the chain's Massachusetts locations

(Newser) - Chipotle was hit with a $1.3 million fine over thousands of child labor violations at its Massachusetts restaurants, the state's attorney general announced Monday. Attorney General Maura Healey ordered the largest child labor penalty ever issued by the state against the Mexican restaurant chain after finding an estimated...

Wendy's Franchisee Hit With $160K Fine Over Child Labor

Labor Dept.: Nearly 450 minors worked illegally at Wendy's in 9 states

(Newser) - A Wendy's franchisee was just hit with a massive fine after the US Department of Labor found it had violated child labor laws, allowing kids employed by restaurants in nine states to work longer hours than they were supposed to, or outside the parameters of when they were allowed...

Cops: 9-Year-Old Child Worker Tortured, Killed by Bosses

They allegedly inserted an air compressor into Sagar Barman's rectum

(Newser) - A 9-year-old factory worker in Bangladesh was killed Sunday when other employees allegedly inserted an air compressor's nozzle into his rectum and turned it on, AFP reports. Police say senior employees were upset Sagar Barman went into a restricted area of Zobeda Textile Mill in Dhaka. But Sagar's...

Report: Apple, Microsoft Use Cobalt Mined by Kids
Report: Apple, Microsoft Use Cobalt Mined by Kids
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
Jan 19, 2016 6:32 AM CST

Report: Apple, Microsoft Use Cobalt Mined by Kids

16 brands named in report couldn't verify source of cobalt

(Newser) - Kids in the Democratic Republic of Congo risk their lives to supply the batteries used in your smartphone and other gadgets, according to a new Amnesty International report. Amnesty and NGO Afrewatch note children as young as 7 mine cobalt for lithium batteries found in products made by Apple, Microsoft,...

Filipino Kids Risk Lives in Country's Deadly Gold Mines

Some mines are 80 feet deep, some are underwater

(Newser) - Thousands of children in the Philippines are working in the country's gold mines, where conditions are deadly and "absolutely terrifying," according to a report published Tuesday by Human Rights Watch. According to Time , the report includes interviews with 65 child miners—some of whom started working in...

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