From the comfort of their offices and luxurious treatments include five to six self-proclaimed non-governmental organizations denounce child labor as employees often rush a five star hotel to another, ultraportables 3000 $ and PDA in hand. Finer discrimination made by the ILO between "child labor" and "child labor" conveniently targets poor countries, while leaving its budget shareholders - in developed countries - off the hook.
Reports on the work surface for children periodically. Children crawling in mines, faces gray, body deformed. Graceful fingers for infants suffering from hunger weaving soccer balls for their more privileged counterparts in the United States. Together in sweatshops small numbers, working conditions can not be described. Everything is heartbreaking and has led to the industry is not so true activists and commentators chalets legal eagles, scholars and politicians sympathetic pushy.
We ask residents in Thailand and sub-Saharan Africa, Brazil, Morocco, and they'll tell you how we see this altruistic hyperactivity - with suspicion and resentment. According compelling arguments lurks project of trade protectionism, but they sincerely believe. Strict - and expensive - Provisions of the work and the environment in international treaties may be a ploy to fend off imports based on cheap labor and the competition they cause the well-nested domestic industries and their agents policies.
It is a matter of discontent, especially as the wealth of the West hypocritical and collected on the broken backs of slaves and children. 1900 census in the United States found that 18 percent of all children - were gainfully employed - nearly a million people in all. The Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional laws banning child labor in late 1916. Revoked this decision in 1941.
Publication of the report by the Government Accountability Office criticized last week that the Ministry of Labour enough attention to working conditions in manufacturing and mining industries in the United States, where many children still. Bureau of Labor Statistics pegs the number of working children aged 15-17 in the United States by 3.7 million people. I worked one in 16 of them in factories and construction. He died more than 600 adolescents accidents over the last ten years.
Child labor - let alone child prostitution, child soldiers, and child slavery - a phenomenon best avoided. But can not and should not be treated in isolation. Should not be subject to minor works to expel coverage. Work in the gold mines or fisheries of the Philippines hardly comparable to waiting tables in Nigeria or elsewhere, an American restaurant.
There are gradations and forms of child labor. Children should not be exposed to hazardous conditions, long working hours, and used as means of payment, physically punished accepted, or serve as sex slaves. This should not contribute to their parents and plant harvesting may be more questionable.
As noted in Miriam Wasserman "The elimination of child labor," published in the Federal West "regional review" in Boston, and the second quarter of 2000, it depends on "family income, education policy and production techniques and cultural norms. " About a quarter of children under -14 to all parts of the world are regular workers. This statistic masks enormous differences between regions like Africa (42 percent) and Latin America (17 percent).
In many languages the poor, child labor is all that separates the family and the life that dominate the world and threatening, destitution. Child labor also significantly lower per capita income increases. Deprive the owners of these breads chance to lift themselves and their families are increasingly above malnutrition, disease and famine - is the height of hypocrisy is immoral.
Quoted "The Economist", a representative of the Association denounced Growers much bananas from Ecuador and Ecuador Minister of Labour, summarized the dilemma precisely: "It is not because they are under the age not mean that we should reject, they have the right to survive, you can not say they can not work, you must provide alternatives. '
Unfortunately, the controversy Laden, even with the emotions and selfish arguments that are often overlooked facts.
Protests conducted against stitched soccer balls for children in Pakistan for the transfer of workshops are Nike and Reebok. Thousands have lost their jobs, including countless women and 7000 of their progeny. Decreased by 20 per cent - and average household income - anyhow meager. Economists Drusilla Brown, Alan Deardorif and Robert Stern command with irony:
"While Baden Sports can take advantage of credibility not stitched footballs to children, and the transfer of production facilities undoubtedly did nothing for their former child workers and their families."
These examples are not lacking. Manufacturers - fearing legal reprisals and "reputation risks" (naming and shaming by NGOs overzealous) - Participation in a protective bag. German garment workshops fired 50,000 children in Bangladesh in 1993 in anticipation of the Children's Act U.S. has never labor legislation deterrence.
City Wasserstein, former Secretary of Labor Notes, Robert Reich:
"You can stop child labor without doing anything out less fortunate children, and they work out of necessity, and most of them, and prevent them from forcing them into prostitution or to work with ' other risks more personal, and the most important thing is to be in school and get an education to help them out of poverty. "
Contrary to the hype, and three quarters of all children work in agriculture and with their families. Less than 1 percent work in mining and another 2 percent in construction. Most other work in retail and services, including "personal services" - a euphemism for prostitution. UNICEF and the ILO are in the throes of creating school networks for child laborers and their families, while providing alternative employment opportunities.
But this is a drop in the ocean of neglect. Poor countries rarely proffer education on a regular basis for more than two-thirds of school-age children are eligible. This is especially true in rural areas where child labor is a scourge on a large scale. , Is an excessive luxury by many parents to intense pressure - Education - especially for women. In many cultures, work is still considered essential in the development of the child and moral strength of character and teaching in the business.
"The Economist" in detail:
"In Africa, children are usually dealing with adults MDs, from an early age every child will perform tasks at home, such as vacuuming or fetch water because it is common to see children working in shops or on the streets poor families often send a child over. wealth for a maid or what is in the hope that it will go to school. '
A solution recently gaining ground is to provide families in poor countries obtain loans secured by the future profits of their children in school. A penetrated the general public - the idea - first proposed by Jean-Marie mixture of the University of Namur and James A. Robinson From the University of California at Berkeley.
Even the World Bank has contributed a few studies, especially in June, "Child labor: the role of fluctuations in income and access to credit in the country," Rajeev Dehejia written by the NBER and Roberta Gatti Group Bank Development Research.
Abusive child labor abhorrent and must be prevented and eliminated. Must cancel all other forms gradually. Developing countries already produce millions of unemployed graduates a year - 100,000 in Morocco alone. Unemployment is endemic in some countries - such as Macedonia - more than a third of the workforce. Children may be treated harshly by their superiors at work, but at least they will not end up in the streets of more threat. Some kids even end up with a skill and are subject to employment.
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