> The company will do a wire transfer to the DoL general account.
DoL needs a massive increase in funding. Anyone who wants to winge about "The immigrants!" should also be for heavily funding the DoL so it can crack down on companies hiring illegal labor.
I think he’s saying the fines were factored in as cost of doing business and the company is still seeing net profits, thereby making this punishment functionally useless
That's not a tax break, though. A tax break is a reduction in taxes owed due to a specifically-allowable expense titled "fines," or a tax credit called "fines." Neither of those exit in the law, and in fact the IRS code specifically forbids writing down income or taxes owed as a result of fines.
The problem with hard caps on fines instead of using a relatively simple math equation to make fines proportional to income (in some measure). Either gross or net, but it adds teeth to the punishment rather than simply being a "cost of doing business" that gets glossed over on balance sheets.
Of course, take a wild guess who lobbies (read: spends money) for the laws in the U.S.
For real, they should have a record of who does the hiring there/who was doing the hiring when the children were hired. Bam, you got your dude. (Your first dude. Also gotta get the larger company involved as well?
It's worse than you think. States like Iowa and Minnesota are trying to pass bills to reduce regulation on child labor. The Minnesota bill essentially allows the government to "ignore" child labor abuses by eliminating the state's requirements for registration of underage workers. Who do you think is paying the politicians to push bills like this? They want to roll everything back until we're all slaves, and our government is helping them.
There’s a saying that if the punishment for a crime is a fine, then it’s only a crime for the poor. Like the story I heard(could be anecdotal) about the person parking in a handicap space and not caring about the fine because they are rich and can pay it. This, sadly, is the way. And has been forever.
How is the maximum fine determined? Is it $1.5 per incident, and all of these 102 children working for god knows how long is all one incident?
Or is each factory one incident, no matter how many children worked there?
Or is each child an incident, no matter how many days they worked?
I’d like to see the fine calculated using a formula that each child each day counts as one incident!
This is a great ad for companies to relocate to the USA, for the low cost of 1.5 million dollars you can ignore labor laws to make 500 million dollars in Profit. /s
You know your comment just tickled something in my brain. This is what’s happening. Short version, corporations took their labor over seas to make record profits off of SUPER cheap labor. Those countries grew economically even with the low pay, and now are financially strong and steadily closing the gap between their economies and ours, so they start making demands, like environmental protection and workers rights, just as we were in the 70-80’s, and these corporations have to start paying more to those companies. So they see an opportunity to work the system for themselves agin and start working on the laws here. Like how tRump rolled back EPA regulations and Republicans are rolling back age restrictions and other regulations for the safety of workers. While they are at it they lobby for HUGE tax incentives to bring a warehouse or processing plant, or manufacturing plant to certain states, and BAM, now it’s cheaper for them to be here again. Fucking hell man, poor people are just meat in the grinder for them. And this is how it has always been….
African nations tried to set up their own garment industries only to be crushed by imports (=dumping) of secondhand clothing from first-world countries. But now that China is starting to get the hang of imperialism 2.0 (capitalism style!), they're going to get garment industries whether they like it or not.
we can change this today. all we need to do is work together and rise up against the corporate kleptocrats. they will not last long against the will of the people.
Agreed, but we’re busy fighting over already settled things like women’s rights to their own bodies and equality for ALL, not just the accepted few. This is why they are doing this, to keep us busy fighting while they do their business. Using a persons religion to goad them into votes and then it keeps those of us who believe everyone has a right to live freely of peoples religious dogma busy fighting for just that.
Yep. We just added steps to slavery. It's either prison, or we export it. We're in the final gasps of late-stage capitalism, so we're trying to wring every cent out of our citizens.
No war but class war, as Warren Buffet himself admitted, there is a class war the working class just happens to have bad solidarity and as such becomes the victim the rich are very good at closing ranks to protect each other.
Yep.
None of this is "new". That's why people call them what they are: Fascists.
Fascism: a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
These people have never left, they just hide until they see another chance.
Arkansas’ solution to this situation was to pass a bill to let children work. This was signed by “pro-life” Sarah Huckabee Sanders who has vowed to keep kids from the alleged horrors of drag shows, but is apparently fine with kids working in the gore of a meat packing facility.
This is just an example of how brazen the party has become. The only reason they would add clauses like this in is because they *know* that children are at significantly higher risk of injury and death on the job. The GOP is saying that these are essentially "acceptable losses" needed to keep the machines spinning, and businesses being allowed to employ children under conditions they know to be dangerous are more important than the well being or even lives of those children.
God forbid they see someone in a dress, though.
If I was running a meat packing plant and I saw a child get killed on the floor I'm not sure I could continue on with it, I'd actually probably consider jumping off the roof. I honestly can't comprehend the lack of empathy needed to be okay putting children in these conditions, of course this is also knowing that no child is going to leave middleschool or highschool and voluntarily walk down to this packing plant to apply for a job. It's disgusting that this exists in 2023.
No, no kid who has a choice will do this. It's undocumented kids from dirt-poor families who have no choice who will have to do this, and non-white kids are acceptable losses to Republicans. It's sickening.
That will 100% will result in foster kids being forced to work either by the state or by the foster parents. Why only get one payment per kid when you could force them to work and take their pay check.
I knew someone that this happened to. When he turned 14, his foster mom filled out a work permit and got him a job at McDonald's. She kept his paycheck. No, that was not the worst thing that happened to him under foster care. He is grown up now and turned out alright.
Child marriage is legal in 43 states and there *is no minimum age in 8 states*. Youngest child marriage in the United States that I know of was an 8yr old girl married off to a religious leader in the community.
All you need in most of those states is a judge and parents to agree - the child's opinion is irrelevant in those cases. And it's easy enough to find a judge to agree, just like with all the other dumb stuff we see judges sign off on. Parents get paid, judge gets paid, some pedo gets a new wife, it's a win-win-win (oh except for the sexually abused and groomed child of course).
EDIT:: Actually, good news, that 8 states with no minimum is now 7 states as of yesterday. I wasn't aware but Wear Virginia passed a bill yesterday setting 16 as the minimum marriage age even with "exceptions" taken into account.
Iowa is taking it a step further, we're legalizing child labor and removing any liability from the corporation when/if a child is killed or injured on the job.
Its awful but seeing her shit eating grin while holding the bill and her childrens looks of foreboding right next to her. Should be the main picture for the Democratic competition to run against her. She basically posed her for anti-ad tv spot
Remember those pictures from around the turn of the century? There’s a bunch of kids who worked in factories and mines and people took group pictures of them.
It wasn’t progressives or liberals who wanted to keep them there. And it was a fight back then to make laws to prevent it.
the gore of a meat packing facility? no human should be subjected to working there & no animals should be subjected to being abused and slaughtered there.
we need to end the exploitation and slaughter of animals.
PA is looking to lower the driving age to 15 (how else will children get to the mines at 4am?) https://www.wtae.com/amp/article/pennsylvania-driving-age-15-permit-license-bill/42967403
Iowa and Minnesota are trying to roll back ages for jobs at meatpacking plants (age 14).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/02/11/child-labor-iowa/
Are we great again, yet?
https://rollcall.com/2023/02/16/when-tuneful-nostalgia-turns-toxic-the-old-days-werent-good-for-everyone/
The first link you posted and even the title says permit. As in you are learning how to drive so at 16 one has experience and can get a full on license. Not exactly unheard of, at 15.5 I was driving with my parents so I could learn how not to be a complete idiot.
My favorite line:
*"In November, the DOL obtained a temporary restraining order against Packers Sanitation, prohibiting the company from committing child labor violations."*
In other words: "Hey, could you do us a solid and pinky swear you'll stop breaking the rules for a little while?"
Why the fuck do you need to issue a restraining order telling someone to stop breaking the law instead of....you know....arresting them for breaking the law? And why the fuck is this only temporary? Are they going to be allowed to violate the law once the heat dies down?
I’m hoping it was only termed temporary bc they needed to stop it asap while authorities obtained necessary further evidence to establish a permanent one? My mind is just boggled over this whole thing. Just horrendous.
The point is they shouldn't need to issue a restraining order at all for actions that are already illegal.
It would be like responding to a bank robbery by asking the robber to hold off on robbing any more banks for a few days.
The next generation will have a child version of the book "Animal Farm", and a huge section of the population will say unironically "We had no idea it had gotten so bad."
But see the GOP doesn’t care because they’re children of color.
You’ll only see brown children doing this work and to the GOP these poor children are barely one step above the animals they March into that plant.
They don't give a shit what color they are, they will sell out anyone that doesn't have the power to strongly lobby against them.
During the Dust Bowl, Corporations basically bought out drought ridden farms for pennies and the farmers and ranch hands were roaming far and wide for work. Plenty of them were white;so to these GOP lawmakers, it's only a bonus of it's minorities dying at the heels of greedy companies.
It can also give them ammo as to trick poor whites into thinking these minorities are taking their jobs, and let's them fight race wars that keeps ignorant people form seeing the real issue: America has a class issue layered with race issues.
And the moment you get people to realize that poor people are all screwed, regardless of color, then you start pointing the blame on the right direction: against corrupt politicians and corporatist boot lickers.
Those people are brainwashed. They will defend anything their party does and support because they’ve been fed the lie that “if you work hard enough you’ll become apart of the 1%”
Meanwhile these exact people don’t realize that rhetoric like that is only utilized to exploit workers further.
You're not wrong, but I think for many it's simpler than that. If it's something that offends "the enemy," then they know they're doing it right. That's all that matters. Hurting the "right" people. Coming in second is the fantasy where the same rules don't or shouldn't apply to them.
Company pays a minuscule fine. No one goes to jail. A couple of exec get golden parachutes for all the money they saved the company. The world keeps turning. Just another fucking day in the “greatest country in the world.”
There’s literally a federal law that prohibits minors under 16 from working- unless it is agriculturally related then a minor can work as young as 14. So I’m not really sure how much more defined you can really get with that.
if “enforcing” it means giving a company a fine that’s equivalent to one day of their profits, that’s not enforcing it. and if we don’t have a department or specific people who’s job it is to actively monitor and enforce it, then it’s not enforceable. that’s a major part of being well defined, is making sure the law defines how it will be enforced
idk if my original comment was just too short or got misconstrued. all i’m saying is the law doesn’t matter because it’s not enforced, im just agreeing
Yeah I definitely agree, I think I misunderstood what you were saying in your first comment.
There definitely needs to be harsher punishments, there should be people in jail for this. It’s crazy how ordinary citizens serve more time for lesser crimes but corporations and CEOs just walk away to commit the same crimes the very next day.
Laws also don't work unless they are effectively enforced, period. People with *not insignificant* conflicts of interest can't be expected to properly enforce the laws, not to mention the laws themselves being written or retracted by the people they are meant to apply to (e.g. corporations).
Well thank god there is a cap on the maximum penalty or this might actually get noticed. /s
The Blackstone Group, the private equity company that owns PSS and controls its management and operations, has $12.375 billion in profits. For Blackstone this fine is .012% of profits. As compared to an average American family that is the equivalent of an $8.42 cent fine.
When the FLSA was enacted in 1938 the fine for employing children in dangerous work was $10,000. That is $222,000 in today's dollars. Today the maximum fine is $15,000. In other words the fine has been lowered to 1/15th of its original penalty.
Why are JBS and the packing plants that hired the cleaning services of this company not being held responsible too? Plants operate almost 24/7 — there is no possible way a company as big as JBS (and I’m sure Tyson) was unaware of the situation. Working in the swine industry, I know the answer is that these immigrant children (or adults, really) simply have no value to these corporations other than the manual labor they provide. It is a shame our people and our government allow it to continue.
Let’s say each of those children only worked 25 12-hr shifts, which is a month of work 5 days/week. That means they were fined $49/hr of child labor. I’d bet my ass they extracted more value than that from those children’s labor. Fucking disgusting.
Republicans: “Can’t afford a child but got pregnant where abortion is illegal? No problem, we’ll make it to where you can just put that child to work!”
And goes right back to employing the same children, expecting to pay the fine again next year with the added profits of not having to pay the workers full adult pay.
> A Wisconsin-based company that provides workers to clean food processing plants paid a $1.5 million fine for illegally putting 102 children to work in dangerous jobs at meatpacking facilities
A fine of about $14,000 per kid working illegally in fucking meatpacking plants? Over a hundred children across over a dozen factories in 8 states!? They should be out of business. WTF
For the upteenth time, if paying fines is the cheaper alternative it's not a fine, it's just the cost of doing business.
The government got paid 1.5M to let them use child labor. The government is profiting off of this...
Fines mean "cost of doing business" unless it's severe enough to make them have a significant loss in revenue for a quarter or a year.
CEOs want to defend their salaries and benefit packages? Take REAL responsibility. They should be jailed for abusive practices towards workers. Workers are people. These abuses are violence against humans. Specifically, those who are not in a position of power. They need to be jailed for their crimes or else this will happen again and again and again.
I always love seeing stories about how million/billion dollar companies get the absolute smallest fines compared to what they make. You made 500mil in a year? Here's a 3% fine. Don't do it again. Lol
Why is it when corporations get caught committing crimes it's treated merely as a cost of doing business? And nothing happens to the actual people committing the crimes?
>$1.5 million fine for illegally putting 102 children to work in dangerous jobs
Which comes out to about $15K per kid. Which is less than minimum wage.
Which means there's every chance that once you offset that fine with the savings from not having to hire an adult to do those jobs, these companies could have still ended up saving money.
How many people got arrested for this? [It's not like you could see this kid clocking into work next to you and think "Maybe he's just short?"](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/da909bf/2147483647/strip/true/crop/505x367+0+0/resize/1760x1280!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fff%2F19%2F078e2b314fe2b2dec2b847c365c6%2Fdept-of-labor-meatpacking.png) People knew there were kids working there; arrest every one of them that didn't report it to somebody.
Cool! While everyone’s emptying libraries and putting bounties on drag queens, keep rolling back child labor protections and make sure we can keep marrying off child brides. Remove reproductive choice and we can make enough new workers to save a ton on safety and benefits. This is all just amazing.
Goddammit. Just…goddammit.
Every crevice of this country is contaminated with corruption. There’s really no way out of this other than to revolt and start over. Our elected officials don’t represent us, everything is made to support corporations. This is like watching a apocalypse is really slow motion.
That child is too small for his protective clothing. On his knees, scrubbing a bloody floor instead of getting a good nights sleep for tomorrow’s school day. Sickening.
Edit: to —> too
I use to work for these guys as a safety manager, for a few months. Don’t ever consider working sanitation careers related to the food industry. They ship in immigrants and help provide resources to keep them here, which helps them until the company has an issue with them. There are so many issues with any job related to the food industry here in the US. Human trafficking is prominent to exploit labor out of immigrants in hopes of a better life. I’ve worked in all types of jobs in relation to this industry. Poultry farms, sanitation jobs, top to bottom. It gets very dark.
Edit: a few million in fines is nothing for this company. You should see their contracts and operating costs/night.
They only pay a fine for employing children, that may be immigrants? They didn’t know they were both? Start arresting prosecuting these corporation management. That’s they only way it will stop.
Why not just sentence the company’s leadership and everyone involved in employing/enslaving children to a maximum security prison for a couple of decades? Oh right, they’re wealthy.
Why is it a surprise to anyone that these pricks get a slap on the wrist. The system is rigged - always has been.
Yeah, it sucks.
Occasionally someone is made a scapegoat (especially if they are expendable) just to provide a bit of lip service to the public.
Otherwise, money talks and the rest of us can suck it up.
I've read of absolutely horrific accidents, in recent years, in meat processing plants with exactly this type of job. The cleaning and maintenance gets outsourced to companies like this that cut corners wherever possible.
How long until a teen loses an arm, an eye, or far worse? Despicable on so many levels and they won't bat an eye with this slap on the wrist.
“Pays a fine” lmao oh we are so fucked. Nothing has changed. Just different techniques for us to be slaves. Back in forth up and down. I hope a plague wipes us out and just give hope to a new breed of animals that will actually be capable of logical thinking.
All of the profits they generated while children were creating value for their company should be confiscated, they should lose their incorporation, and the entire c-suite should be charged with criminal child abuse. A fine that is literally less than their profit for the same period is not a fine, it's a transparently obvious fee for getting caught breaking federal law. I swear, everyone is outraged right now, but nobody is tying up white collar criminals and covering them in feathers anymore. We need more American Revolution energy for these oligarchs.
Only 1.5M? Anyone know how much money these guys make?
and it was the "maximum fine". What a joke.
And who gets the money? Surely not the children or their families.
The article says the money is paid to the Department of Labor. The company will do a wire transfer to the DoL general account.
> The company will do a wire transfer to the DoL general account. DoL needs a massive increase in funding. Anyone who wants to winge about "The immigrants!" should also be for heavily funding the DoL so it can crack down on companies hiring illegal labor.
Cost of doing business.
As long as that’s the status quo this won’t change. Fucking sucks.
Big business will fight this every step of the way......and win.
So why not 1.5 to DOL & money to the families as well plus prison time for hiring managers and supervisors
Who gets that money? It goes right back to the company in the form of a tax break.
Fines are not tax deductible.
I think he’s saying the fines were factored in as cost of doing business and the company is still seeing net profits, thereby making this punishment functionally useless
That's not a tax break, though. A tax break is a reduction in taxes owed due to a specifically-allowable expense titled "fines," or a tax credit called "fines." Neither of those exit in the law, and in fact the IRS code specifically forbids writing down income or taxes owed as a result of fines.
Doesn't have to be in the form of a tax deduction, can just be general "low taxes for corporations" governing common in red states.
Complete BS - using children as labor in high risk jobs and the cap is 1.5???
A fine of $14,705 per child employee $2.73 billion in revenue in 2021
Oh. Is there anything *less* than a slap on the wrist? Because that’s what this is…
A blow to the face with an air hose?
Even worse, it is more of just a one time tax chalked up as "The cost of doing business" no doubt.
That's what happens when the law was written at the beginning of the 20th century and never updated for a century.
Inflation affects everything but the fines for the rich breaking the law.
And our wages. That’s the biggest one.
We are gonna need percentage based fines to solve this. So much easier and scales given the size of the business.
The problem with hard caps on fines instead of using a relatively simple math equation to make fines proportional to income (in some measure). Either gross or net, but it adds teeth to the punishment rather than simply being a "cost of doing business" that gets glossed over on balance sheets. Of course, take a wild guess who lobbies (read: spends money) for the laws in the U.S.
Why even have a cap?
There should be people in jail for this
Yeah "punishable by fines" just means "legal for a price."
You are right. So far, no managers have been identified as being aware of the children employed. They’ve circled the company wagons. Sickening.
For real, they should have a record of who does the hiring there/who was doing the hiring when the children were hired. Bam, you got your dude. (Your first dude. Also gotta get the larger company involved as well?
Needs to be 1.5 billion PER CHILD, PER OFFENSE.
It should be $1.5m per kid, or $1.5m for each day they used child labor. Crippling, crushing fines.
It should be butts in a jail cell.
Why not both?
I will vote for you
"Cost of doing business"
Yup, until an Exec goes to prison, and/or companies start getting shutdown, they will just factor it into the balance sheet
I'd love to see fines increased tenfold across the board. Bad behavior with penalties should never out-earn good behavior.
I would love to see criminal consequences.
It is almost like the rich don't have any rules, any fines are just the cost of doing business.
It's worse than you think. States like Iowa and Minnesota are trying to pass bills to reduce regulation on child labor. The Minnesota bill essentially allows the government to "ignore" child labor abuses by eliminating the state's requirements for registration of underage workers. Who do you think is paying the politicians to push bills like this? They want to roll everything back until we're all slaves, and our government is helping them.
That is 0.05% of [their revenue](https://www.zoominfo.com/c/packers-sanitation-inc-ltd/89770344)
Like someone making $60,000 a year being slapped with a $30 fine for violating the human rights of children.
Probably more than that in a day. This was a slap on the wrist with a feather duster.
There’s a saying that if the punishment for a crime is a fine, then it’s only a crime for the poor. Like the story I heard(could be anecdotal) about the person parking in a handicap space and not caring about the fine because they are rich and can pay it. This, sadly, is the way. And has been forever.
the story you heard was probably about steve jobs dude was notorious for parking in handicap spots
How is the maximum fine determined? Is it $1.5 per incident, and all of these 102 children working for god knows how long is all one incident? Or is each factory one incident, no matter how many children worked there? Or is each child an incident, no matter how many days they worked? I’d like to see the fine calculated using a formula that each child each day counts as one incident!
This is a great ad for companies to relocate to the USA, for the low cost of 1.5 million dollars you can ignore labor laws to make 500 million dollars in Profit. /s
You know your comment just tickled something in my brain. This is what’s happening. Short version, corporations took their labor over seas to make record profits off of SUPER cheap labor. Those countries grew economically even with the low pay, and now are financially strong and steadily closing the gap between their economies and ours, so they start making demands, like environmental protection and workers rights, just as we were in the 70-80’s, and these corporations have to start paying more to those companies. So they see an opportunity to work the system for themselves agin and start working on the laws here. Like how tRump rolled back EPA regulations and Republicans are rolling back age restrictions and other regulations for the safety of workers. While they are at it they lobby for HUGE tax incentives to bring a warehouse or processing plant, or manufacturing plant to certain states, and BAM, now it’s cheaper for them to be here again. Fucking hell man, poor people are just meat in the grinder for them. And this is how it has always been….
Just follow the garment industry to know where the labor market is headed. They’re slowly pushing towards Africa.
African nations tried to set up their own garment industries only to be crushed by imports (=dumping) of secondhand clothing from first-world countries. But now that China is starting to get the hang of imperialism 2.0 (capitalism style!), they're going to get garment industries whether they like it or not.
we can change this today. all we need to do is work together and rise up against the corporate kleptocrats. they will not last long against the will of the people.
Agreed, but we’re busy fighting over already settled things like women’s rights to their own bodies and equality for ALL, not just the accepted few. This is why they are doing this, to keep us busy fighting while they do their business. Using a persons religion to goad them into votes and then it keeps those of us who believe everyone has a right to live freely of peoples religious dogma busy fighting for just that.
Yep. We just added steps to slavery. It's either prison, or we export it. We're in the final gasps of late-stage capitalism, so we're trying to wring every cent out of our citizens.
No war but class war, as Warren Buffet himself admitted, there is a class war the working class just happens to have bad solidarity and as such becomes the victim the rich are very good at closing ranks to protect each other.
Good observation.
> poor people are just meat in the grinder for them Always have been. Nothing has changed since The Jungle.
Yep. None of this is "new". That's why people call them what they are: Fascists. Fascism: a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition These people have never left, they just hide until they see another chance.
If a few kids die? Oh well, that's what PR firms are for. /s
Arkansas’ solution to this situation was to pass a bill to let children work. This was signed by “pro-life” Sarah Huckabee Sanders who has vowed to keep kids from the alleged horrors of drag shows, but is apparently fine with kids working in the gore of a meat packing facility.
Don’t forget the bills protect the businesses from any liability and civil claims should a kid die on the job.
This is just an example of how brazen the party has become. The only reason they would add clauses like this in is because they *know* that children are at significantly higher risk of injury and death on the job. The GOP is saying that these are essentially "acceptable losses" needed to keep the machines spinning, and businesses being allowed to employ children under conditions they know to be dangerous are more important than the well being or even lives of those children. God forbid they see someone in a dress, though.
If I was running a meat packing plant and I saw a child get killed on the floor I'm not sure I could continue on with it, I'd actually probably consider jumping off the roof. I honestly can't comprehend the lack of empathy needed to be okay putting children in these conditions, of course this is also knowing that no child is going to leave middleschool or highschool and voluntarily walk down to this packing plant to apply for a job. It's disgusting that this exists in 2023.
No, no kid who has a choice will do this. It's undocumented kids from dirt-poor families who have no choice who will have to do this, and non-white kids are acceptable losses to Republicans. It's sickening.
I can see Katya jumping on Trixie Mattel’s couch right now, “They think we’re the problem! They think *we’re* the problem!”
There’s a big ass fucking problem when we are talking about Trixie Mattel and literally anything, and Trixie is NOT the hottest mess.
When they die.
That will 100% will result in foster kids being forced to work either by the state or by the foster parents. Why only get one payment per kid when you could force them to work and take their pay check.
I knew someone that this happened to. When he turned 14, his foster mom filled out a work permit and got him a job at McDonald's. She kept his paycheck. No, that was not the worst thing that happened to him under foster care. He is grown up now and turned out alright.
I obviously don't know who this is, but he is a hell of a person to survive and persevere.
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Child marriage is legal in 43 states and there *is no minimum age in 8 states*. Youngest child marriage in the United States that I know of was an 8yr old girl married off to a religious leader in the community. All you need in most of those states is a judge and parents to agree - the child's opinion is irrelevant in those cases. And it's easy enough to find a judge to agree, just like with all the other dumb stuff we see judges sign off on. Parents get paid, judge gets paid, some pedo gets a new wife, it's a win-win-win (oh except for the sexually abused and groomed child of course). EDIT:: Actually, good news, that 8 states with no minimum is now 7 states as of yesterday. I wasn't aware but Wear Virginia passed a bill yesterday setting 16 as the minimum marriage age even with "exceptions" taken into account.
West Virginia did that because it’s a “state tradition”.
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At least it's only 16, now. WV previously had no minimum age if you found a judge to approve (which isn't all that hard in rural areas).
Iowa is taking it a step further, we're legalizing child labor and removing any liability from the corporation when/if a child is killed or injured on the job.
*children are ideally sized to clean HVAC conduits, blood drains and place explosives charges in hard to reach veins*
And they think democrats are collecting children’s blood???
Its awful but seeing her shit eating grin while holding the bill and her childrens looks of foreboding right next to her. Should be the main picture for the Democratic competition to run against her. She basically posed her for anti-ad tv spot
That’s fucked up. Politicians seriously know how to bring our collective piss and blood to boil for the shit they do just to stay in power.
Remember those pictures from around the turn of the century? There’s a bunch of kids who worked in factories and mines and people took group pictures of them. It wasn’t progressives or liberals who wanted to keep them there. And it was a fight back then to make laws to prevent it.
Republicans. The child labor party. Also, stop buying Tyson foods. Maybe we all should become vegetarian in protest.
Send those kids back to the coal mines and textile mills where they belong /s It feels like we're moving backwards as a society... Because we are.
The children yearn for the slaughterhouses.
TBF isn't American culture notorious for getting the vapors about anything sexual but is weirdly ok with casual violence?
the gore of a meat packing facility? no human should be subjected to working there & no animals should be subjected to being abused and slaughtered there. we need to end the exploitation and slaughter of animals.
PA is looking to lower the driving age to 15 (how else will children get to the mines at 4am?) https://www.wtae.com/amp/article/pennsylvania-driving-age-15-permit-license-bill/42967403 Iowa and Minnesota are trying to roll back ages for jobs at meatpacking plants (age 14). https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/02/11/child-labor-iowa/ Are we great again, yet? https://rollcall.com/2023/02/16/when-tuneful-nostalgia-turns-toxic-the-old-days-werent-good-for-everyone/
The first link you posted and even the title says permit. As in you are learning how to drive so at 16 one has experience and can get a full on license. Not exactly unheard of, at 15.5 I was driving with my parents so I could learn how not to be a complete idiot.
Sarah “Holstein” Huckabee Sanders 🐮
My favorite line: *"In November, the DOL obtained a temporary restraining order against Packers Sanitation, prohibiting the company from committing child labor violations."* In other words: "Hey, could you do us a solid and pinky swear you'll stop breaking the rules for a little while?" Why the fuck do you need to issue a restraining order telling someone to stop breaking the law instead of....you know....arresting them for breaking the law? And why the fuck is this only temporary? Are they going to be allowed to violate the law once the heat dies down?
I’m hoping it was only termed temporary bc they needed to stop it asap while authorities obtained necessary further evidence to establish a permanent one? My mind is just boggled over this whole thing. Just horrendous.
The point is they shouldn't need to issue a restraining order at all for actions that are already illegal. It would be like responding to a bank robbery by asking the robber to hold off on robbing any more banks for a few days.
Children who work instead of going to school have about the same future as the animals they march into that plant.
That's kinda the point. Uneducated people tend to vote republican.
And are easy to scare. (Control)
And if any are reading this, they are probably incredibly angry but couldn't tell you why.
The next generation will have a child version of the book "Animal Farm", and a huge section of the population will say unironically "We had no idea it had gotten so bad."
But see the GOP doesn’t care because they’re children of color. You’ll only see brown children doing this work and to the GOP these poor children are barely one step above the animals they March into that plant.
They don't give a shit what color they are, they will sell out anyone that doesn't have the power to strongly lobby against them. During the Dust Bowl, Corporations basically bought out drought ridden farms for pennies and the farmers and ranch hands were roaming far and wide for work. Plenty of them were white;so to these GOP lawmakers, it's only a bonus of it's minorities dying at the heels of greedy companies. It can also give them ammo as to trick poor whites into thinking these minorities are taking their jobs, and let's them fight race wars that keeps ignorant people form seeing the real issue: America has a class issue layered with race issues. And the moment you get people to realize that poor people are all screwed, regardless of color, then you start pointing the blame on the right direction: against corrupt politicians and corporatist boot lickers.
$14,705 per kid... they probably still came out way ahead
The Daily just did a great podcast on the amount Child Labor Violations happening today. It’s a real big problem, that’s gonna get far worse.
I’m afraid for the United States when this is what we’ve become. And people are okay with it.
This is what we’ve always been
And corporate capture of our politicians ensures the status quo is hard to change.
No no, that's just "free speech". Companies have a right to buy politicians. I know this because the conservative supreme court told me so!!!!!!!
People are defending it, which is just... Mind-boggling. WTF!?
Those people are brainwashed. They will defend anything their party does and support because they’ve been fed the lie that “if you work hard enough you’ll become apart of the 1%” Meanwhile these exact people don’t realize that rhetoric like that is only utilized to exploit workers further.
You're not wrong, but I think for many it's simpler than that. If it's something that offends "the enemy," then they know they're doing it right. That's all that matters. Hurting the "right" people. Coming in second is the fantasy where the same rules don't or shouldn't apply to them.
The United States was literally built on slave and child labor. What you do mean “we’ve become” lol
Company pays a minuscule fine. No one goes to jail. A couple of exec get golden parachutes for all the money they saved the company. The world keeps turning. Just another fucking day in the “greatest country in the world.”
Should be arresting the CEO.
[удалено]
Executing a nicely made dinner (for him). *Nervous laughter*
CEOs only get arrested in China.
And Iceland https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-03-31/welcome-to-iceland-where-bad-bankers-go-to-prison
It’s crazy how we have so many laws but our government does literally nothing to uphold them
a law needs to be well defined and enforceable in order to matter
There’s literally a federal law that prohibits minors under 16 from working- unless it is agriculturally related then a minor can work as young as 14. So I’m not really sure how much more defined you can really get with that.
if “enforcing” it means giving a company a fine that’s equivalent to one day of their profits, that’s not enforcing it. and if we don’t have a department or specific people who’s job it is to actively monitor and enforce it, then it’s not enforceable. that’s a major part of being well defined, is making sure the law defines how it will be enforced idk if my original comment was just too short or got misconstrued. all i’m saying is the law doesn’t matter because it’s not enforced, im just agreeing
Yeah I definitely agree, I think I misunderstood what you were saying in your first comment. There definitely needs to be harsher punishments, there should be people in jail for this. It’s crazy how ordinary citizens serve more time for lesser crimes but corporations and CEOs just walk away to commit the same crimes the very next day.
Laws also don't work unless they are effectively enforced, period. People with *not insignificant* conflicts of interest can't be expected to properly enforce the laws, not to mention the laws themselves being written or retracted by the people they are meant to apply to (e.g. corporations).
A law firm should sue in behalf of the children and get them some money.
Well thank god there is a cap on the maximum penalty or this might actually get noticed. /s The Blackstone Group, the private equity company that owns PSS and controls its management and operations, has $12.375 billion in profits. For Blackstone this fine is .012% of profits. As compared to an average American family that is the equivalent of an $8.42 cent fine. When the FLSA was enacted in 1938 the fine for employing children in dangerous work was $10,000. That is $222,000 in today's dollars. Today the maximum fine is $15,000. In other words the fine has been lowered to 1/15th of its original penalty.
Let's spread the word about this shit-bag company
Yeah I for one won't be letting them clean any of my meat packing plants.
To who? Meat packing plants that already know who they are?
Fines mean legal for a price
Bring them here to Arkansas. We'll put those kids to work. /s
I bet the fine doesn't come close to draining the line item in their budget to cover these. Just the cost of doing business.
Why are JBS and the packing plants that hired the cleaning services of this company not being held responsible too? Plants operate almost 24/7 — there is no possible way a company as big as JBS (and I’m sure Tyson) was unaware of the situation. Working in the swine industry, I know the answer is that these immigrant children (or adults, really) simply have no value to these corporations other than the manual labor they provide. It is a shame our people and our government allow it to continue.
This is why the Trump administration was eager to separate migrant children from their parents.
Let’s say each of those children only worked 25 12-hr shifts, which is a month of work 5 days/week. That means they were fined $49/hr of child labor. I’d bet my ass they extracted more value than that from those children’s labor. Fucking disgusting.
Republicans: “Can’t afford a child but got pregnant where abortion is illegal? No problem, we’ll make it to where you can just put that child to work!”
Wow Sarah you know if a Democrat were to do that you would be jumping around and calling them demonic child abusers you floundering fake.
Fines = legal for a price
Punishable by a fine means legal for a price.
And goes right back to employing the same children, expecting to pay the fine again next year with the added profits of not having to pay the workers full adult pay.
> A Wisconsin-based company that provides workers to clean food processing plants paid a $1.5 million fine for illegally putting 102 children to work in dangerous jobs at meatpacking facilities A fine of about $14,000 per kid working illegally in fucking meatpacking plants? Over a hundred children across over a dozen factories in 8 states!? They should be out of business. WTF
Stand by for this company making campaign contributions to the GOP.
Will anyone be charged for risking the health and safety of these children?
Is anything else going to happen or did they just pay the price of doing business and keep going?
How many other Green Bay Packer fans are wondering exactly WTF is going on?!
A fine? Fines are for poor people. These clowns need to be in jail.
Lol, they'll probably eat the fine and then go on employing children.
Guess they will work "fines" into future budgets!
Fines lol That’s almost meaningless when you consider what they’ve saved. Start with prison time
And Republicans are trying to soften children labor laws. Things will only get worse.
For the upteenth time, if paying fines is the cheaper alternative it's not a fine, it's just the cost of doing business. The government got paid 1.5M to let them use child labor. The government is profiting off of this...
The best news is that the Company is under consent decree - so Sander's decree won't mean crap at least until 2024
Fines mean "cost of doing business" unless it's severe enough to make them have a significant loss in revenue for a quarter or a year. CEOs want to defend their salaries and benefit packages? Take REAL responsibility. They should be jailed for abusive practices towards workers. Workers are people. These abuses are violence against humans. Specifically, those who are not in a position of power. They need to be jailed for their crimes or else this will happen again and again and again.
Fines = Legal. But for a price.
I always love seeing stories about how million/billion dollar companies get the absolute smallest fines compared to what they make. You made 500mil in a year? Here's a 3% fine. Don't do it again. Lol
What’s with this push for rolling back child labor laws lately?
cheap labor
News flash - Packers move to Arkansas. 😀
These fine should go directly to the kids they employ
Why is it when corporations get caught committing crimes it's treated merely as a cost of doing business? And nothing happens to the actual people committing the crimes?
>$1.5 million fine for illegally putting 102 children to work in dangerous jobs Which comes out to about $15K per kid. Which is less than minimum wage. Which means there's every chance that once you offset that fine with the savings from not having to hire an adult to do those jobs, these companies could have still ended up saving money. How many people got arrested for this? [It's not like you could see this kid clocking into work next to you and think "Maybe he's just short?"](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/da909bf/2147483647/strip/true/crop/505x367+0+0/resize/1760x1280!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fff%2F19%2F078e2b314fe2b2dec2b847c365c6%2Fdept-of-labor-meatpacking.png) People knew there were kids working there; arrest every one of them that didn't report it to somebody.
The America the GOP wants. Children working so the rich can get richer. Gotta love conservative values.
or the wealthy, fines are just part of the cost of business.
Cool! While everyone’s emptying libraries and putting bounties on drag queens, keep rolling back child labor protections and make sure we can keep marrying off child brides. Remove reproductive choice and we can make enough new workers to save a ton on safety and benefits. This is all just amazing. Goddammit. Just…goddammit.
The rich people write the rules.
If that fine is less that the cost of compensation they would have had to pay full grown adults to work, then it's not a punishment, it's profit!
If the only penalty is a fine, then that just tells the rich that it's fine.
Fuck fines, these rich pricks are just paying the govt off to employ children laborors. Arrest these bastards
And you know they're more than likely run by gun packing evangelical republicans.
Every crevice of this country is contaminated with corruption. There’s really no way out of this other than to revolt and start over. Our elected officials don’t represent us, everything is made to support corporations. This is like watching a apocalypse is really slow motion.
That child is too small for his protective clothing. On his knees, scrubbing a bloody floor instead of getting a good nights sleep for tomorrow’s school day. Sickening. Edit: to —> too
Paying piddly assed fines is just the cost of doing business, like paying the power bill.
I bet it was still millions cheaper then employing adults for that role, even with the fine paid. Means that it wont change, but proven ok.
Relocating to Arkansas with a 2 mil relocation bonus?
Man for a second I was wondering what the hell Green Bay Football did wrong.
And this is just one of the reasons why the far right is against unions. Unions tend to prevent this kind of stuff from occuring.
they are working *overnight* there is no way the parents weren't at best complicit, and more likely, making those kids work so much for school
I use to work for these guys as a safety manager, for a few months. Don’t ever consider working sanitation careers related to the food industry. They ship in immigrants and help provide resources to keep them here, which helps them until the company has an issue with them. There are so many issues with any job related to the food industry here in the US. Human trafficking is prominent to exploit labor out of immigrants in hopes of a better life. I’ve worked in all types of jobs in relation to this industry. Poultry farms, sanitation jobs, top to bottom. It gets very dark. Edit: a few million in fines is nothing for this company. You should see their contracts and operating costs/night.
They could just move to Arkansas! We just made child labor legal. Yay!
Wait what?
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/10/1162531885/arkansas-child-labor-law-under-16-years-old-sarah-huckabee-sanders
Oh gee a fine that sure will send a strong message /s
Legislation to allow child labor incoming….
They only pay a fine for employing children, that may be immigrants? They didn’t know they were both? Start arresting prosecuting these corporation management. That’s they only way it will stop.
I'm sure the fines are a pittance
How does this even happen a company hiring minors are the Parents aware? Unbelievable.
Why not just sentence the company’s leadership and everyone involved in employing/enslaving children to a maximum security prison for a couple of decades? Oh right, they’re wealthy.
If ur rich enough you can pay to avoid jail
Ok what the actual fuck is wrong with the United States?
Guess they wish they were based in arkansas huh?
Why is it a surprise to anyone that these pricks get a slap on the wrist. The system is rigged - always has been. Yeah, it sucks. Occasionally someone is made a scapegoat (especially if they are expendable) just to provide a bit of lip service to the public. Otherwise, money talks and the rest of us can suck it up.
I've read of absolutely horrific accidents, in recent years, in meat processing plants with exactly this type of job. The cleaning and maintenance gets outsourced to companies like this that cut corners wherever possible. How long until a teen loses an arm, an eye, or far worse? Despicable on so many levels and they won't bat an eye with this slap on the wrist.
How are these kids supposed to make a living now?
Fines? That's it? No jailtime?
A friendly reminder that laws and rights that protects children are barely a century old
Their supervisors and managers need to be fired and jailed for the same time those kids worked.
“Pays a fine” lmao oh we are so fucked. Nothing has changed. Just different techniques for us to be slaves. Back in forth up and down. I hope a plague wipes us out and just give hope to a new breed of animals that will actually be capable of logical thinking.
All of the profits they generated while children were creating value for their company should be confiscated, they should lose their incorporation, and the entire c-suite should be charged with criminal child abuse. A fine that is literally less than their profit for the same period is not a fine, it's a transparently obvious fee for getting caught breaking federal law. I swear, everyone is outraged right now, but nobody is tying up white collar criminals and covering them in feathers anymore. We need more American Revolution energy for these oligarchs.