Children ages 14 and 15 would no longer need a work permit or parental permission to get a job under a bill Wisconsin Republican lawmakers released on Friday, the Associated Press reports.
The proposal comes amid a wider push by state lawmakers to roll back child labor laws and despite the efforts of federal investigators to crack down on a surge in child labor violations nationally.
Under current law, 14- and 15-year-olds in Wisconsin are prohibited from working most jobs unless they have permission from a parent or guardian and have verified their age with the state Department of Workforce Development. The department can revoke youth work permits at any time if it believes a child’s safety is being threatened.
The bill continues to require employers to keep their own records of employees’ ages and hours worked, but without work permits verified by a state agency, companies caught violating child labor laws can more easily claim ignorance.
Earlier this year, the Labor Department fined Wisconsin-based meat packing contractor Packers Sanitation more than $1.5 million for employing at least 100 children, some as young as 13, to clean dangerous equipment such as bone saws and skull splitters in plants across the U.S. The company claimed it wasn’t aware that those workers were minors but said it has since taken steps to improve the way it verifies employees’ ages.
The work permit bill proposed Friday follows little more than a month after a 16-year-old boy in northern Wisconsin died while working at a sawmill. Initial reports suggest that Michael Schuls was performing work allowed by state laws when he was killed by a wood-stacking machine, but his death and the deaths of other teen workers this summer have brought increased attention to child labor rules.
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers is unlikely to sign the proposal into law if it passes the Republican-controlled Legislature. He vetoed a bill last year that would have let 14- and 15-year-olds work later hours during the summer.
