This anthology focuses on the exploitation of the least powerful members of the labor force, primarily women and children.

Study of the social implications of child labour among migrant workers in the USA, commenting on violations of labour legislation in respect of minimum wage, minimum age and working conditions for young workers in the rural worker force - includes interviews with migrant workers (incl. Minority group workers) and their families, and covers living conditions, poverty, access to education, occupational health and occupational safety, farmers' attitudes, etc. Bibliography pp. 206 to 212, illustrations and references.

Despite its decline throughout the advanced industrial nations, child labor remains one of the major social, political, and economic concerns of modern history, as witnessed by the many high-profile stories on child labor and sweatshops in the media today. This work considers the issue in three parts. The first section discusses child labor as a social and economic problem in America from an historical and theoretical perspective. The second part presents child labor as National Child Labor Committee investigators found it in major American industries and occupations, including coal mines, cotton textile mills, and sweatshops in the early 1900s. Finally, the concluding section integrates these findings and attempts to apply them to child labor problems in America and the rest of the world today.

Abuses of child and adult workers have led to protests, boycotts, and treaties to end child labor and sweatshops. Everyone agrees the worst practices must be stopped. But debate rages over the underlying causes, and whether workplace exploitation is an inevitable step in economic development or an avoidable human rights violation.

Presents different viewpoints on the issues of child labor and sweatshops.

Present your readers with a truly global review of the issue of child labor. Essays are collected from highly respected international sources, sharing viewpoints from places such as Bolivia, West Africa, South Asia, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan, Ireland, and Brazil. Readers will learn about children who work in coal mines, the sex trade, agriculture, and other industries. Essential essays share information regarding the responsibility of corporations to stop child labor. Essay sources include The Anti-Slavery Society, Global March Against Child Labour, The Child Workers in Asia Foundation, International Labour Organization, and the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers.

At the close of the 19th century, more than 2 million American children under age 16--some as young as 4 or 5--were employed on farms, in mills, canneries, factories, mines and offices, or selling newspapers and fruits and vegetables on the streets. The crusaders of the Progressive Era believed child labor was an evil that maimed the children, exploited the poor and suppressed adult wages. The child should be in school till age 16, they demanded, in order to become a good citizen. The battle for and against child labor was fought in the press as well as state and federal legislatures. Several federal efforts to ban child labor were struck down by the Supreme Court and an attempt to amend the Constitution to ban child labor failed to gain enough support. It took the Great Depression and New Deal legislation to pass the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (and receive the support of the Supreme Court). This history of American child labor details the extent to which children worked in various industries, the debate over health and social effects, and the long battle with agricultural and industrial interests to curtail the practice.