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kckitty's avatar

Why can't these companies find adults to do this work? Also, WHAT are they paying these children???

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hvdv's avatar

My guess is they'll start srsly raising prices and blame it on, I dunno, the deep state? Is that still a thing? Anyway the problem is many Americans demand cheap meat (plus, cozy relationships between food industry and govt. for at least 50 years, uninterrupted), so it might just work.

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RRJKR's avatar

Doncha just adore those young conservatives. 30 somethings preaching about how we need to get back to the way things "used to be" Grrrr,,,!! Things aren't the way they "used to be" because they were fucked up and we fixed them!!

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RRJKR's avatar

I do so love discussing the advantages and disadvantages of child labor laws. I thought this issue had been settled 100 years ago. children need to be in school not working at the "plant". What's up next? Slavery? Did liberals rush to judgement when they outlawed that? Perhaps, like abortion, it's a topic that would be best left for the individual States to decide. Wait... isn't that all the slave States were asking for? if this SCOTUS had been sitting in 1860, we could have avoided the Civil War!!

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Zyxomma's avatar

Ta, Robyn. No children in coal mines, no children in slaughterhouses or processing facilities -- I almost said processing plants, but I like plants.

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CounterSniper's avatar

If they get shut down for a month then they should be forced to pay their employees for the difference between 100% pay and what unemployment covers.

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John Ranta's avatar

This poultry company will have to pay more to hire adults to do this work. Which means their chicken will cost more. As it should. They should also raise these chickens in decent conditions, with plenty of space and healthy food. The American quest for cheap food is what leads to 16 year olds working in slaughterhouses. Food should be good, not cheap.

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Who is this and where am I's avatar

But their little hands more effectively clean all the tiny nooks and crannies of the meat grinders! Do you want dysentery???

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RRJKR's avatar

I make the same observation below. some jobs just require tiny hands!

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Bitter Scribe's avatar

You know who would love to do the jobs that those kids aren't supposed to be doing? Their parents.

And you know why those parents can't? Because of this country's stupid, fucked-up immigration policy.

The kids who were working on that kill floor almost certainly entered the U.S. as unaccompanied minors. They did that because unaccompanied minors are the only ones who can be released into the U.S.

LET THE PARENTS IN. More broadly, allow immigration by adults of all kinds who are willing and eager to do the jobs in meat plants and many other places that cannot find the labor they desperately need.

It's not complicated. What's complicated is the politics, meaning having to overcome a lot of racism.

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TakingAmes's avatar

But when PAB deports everyone browner than a sheet of copy paper, we’ll stop having this problem. It certainly won’t cause untold economic damage to this community.

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Prostate of Dorian Gray's avatar

Kids just can't be trusted with that kind of mechanical shit. There's too much attention to detail with machines that can kill you that a teenager isn't keeping in the forefront of their mind. Not that an adult doesn't have a lapse in judgement for a second, but it's just different.

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UnionThuggery's avatar

The economic impact of this injunction is going to be painful in mostly rural areas that I guarantee will blame evil communist government regulation for the loss of wages and spike in chicken prices, rather than the poor honest company that put children at risk.

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zb23's avatar

this is probably an example of the precious freedoms that evil libs try to take away from True American Patriots.

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Rob Roser's avatar

I mean, you say you care about the kids yet you want to put hundreds of them out of work for a month and begrudge them the youthful joy of making minimum wage slaughtering thousands of animals and watching their friends die?? Think of the children...

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OrdinaryJoe's avatar

I started working summers when I was fourteen. Got paid US minimum wage at all of them. Most dangerous part of the job was getting off the city bus in the morning. My bosses looked out for me, made sure I took breaks and got to lunch. But this is just a bunch of Messicun kids so who gives a fuck? More where they come from, just like the chickens.

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Biff52, Safe from TX floods's avatar

I was fourteen when I started my Blue Dot LSD distribution business. My bosses looked after me too, but not for any idealistic purposes. They wanted their money.

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RRJKR's avatar

Child labor laws, overtime pay, sick leave, vacation leave, unemployment comp. retirement plans etc, only exist because of unions yet people, especially young people, are being taught to hate unions. Wonder why?

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UnionThuggery's avatar

My experience is the younger generation isn't buying the anti-union rhetoric. They come in far more eager to be a part of a union than the gen-x and early millennials are. The younger millennials and zoomers are far more pro union.

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RRJKR's avatar

I hope you are correct. Gives me hope.

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Prostate of Dorian Gray's avatar

The fucking over they're getting from capitalism is a lot more callous and overt than what we grew up with. The kids are alright.

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