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- Embed this notice@CharleneTeglia @WorkingFamilies before you freak out over nothing this bill only expands the work opportunities for 16 and older. I wouldn't call this "child labor".
I had my first job at 13 (delivering newspapers) and by 15 I was working at a hardware store / HVAC / electrical / plumbing operation and when I got my drivers license I was driving work trucks, delivering stuff, and even running forklifts to move/unload inventory when I wasn't tending to the store and doing fun stuff like learning how to wire electric motors and replace their starter caps and stuff. This experience completely changed my life and gave me knowledge and skills that it seems nobody in my generation has unless they went into the trades.
And I loved it. It was fantastic. I had mornings when I had to get up at 5am to open the store and meet the delivery truck so I could unload it before I went to my highschool. I also had the opportunity in my senior year of highschool to skip half the school day and go to work and get credits via the School to Work program. (I had all my credits, I just skipped a study hall, a gym class, and an optional but useless accounting class -- my dad was a banker and I knew full well how to balance a checkbook...)
I will say that sending kids to detassel corn is incredibly abusive and cruel and probably unhealthy to have them in the hot sun for 8 hours straight while they're getting sliced up by corn leaves and absorbing all the pesticides through their skin. Thank god I had such an allergic reaction that I never had to go back...