At 10 PM, a 16-year-old clocked in to their shift. They spent the next 6 hours cleaning a meat grinder with a pressure hose. At 4 AM they clocked out. At 8:50 AM, their school day started. Though this scene may sound like an excerpt from Upton Sinclair’s 1906 novel, The Jungle, it actually describes the life of a Marshall, Minnesota 16-year-old in 2022.

This story underscores a sad truth: Minnesota is in the middle of a 21st century child labor crisis. “Exploited Youth” demonstrates the scope of this crisis and recommends policy solutions to advance a more just and healthy labor system for our state’s youth.

KEY FINDINGS

• Child labor violations are on the rise in Minnesota. The number of minors involved in federal child labor violations in the North Star State rose by 250% from 2021 to 2023.
• The findings in this report assuredly understate the true extent of Minnesota’s child labor issues given the difficulties young people face in reporting their exploitation and the capacity issues that prevent investigators from pursuing all complaints.
• Child labor violations have significant adverse impacts on young people. Making minors work longer hours increases the risk of physical injuries and hurts educational and health outcomes, creating lifelong consequences.

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

• Address Minnesota’s child labor laws that fail to match federal standards, helping to avoid confusion and safeguard against the potential rollback of federal protections under President Trump.
• Create a meaningful system of youth work permits that increases parental and employer awareness of child labor laws and helps proactively block child labor violations.
• Prohibit overwork for school-age minors by setting working hour guidelines for 16 and 17-year-old workers, as is done in at least 20 other states.
• Require a high school curriculum that improves young people’s understanding of their workplace rights.
• Strengthen the investigative and enforcement capacity of the state so that it can actively monitor and prevent child labor violations, while increasing penalties for these violations to sufficiently deter employers from engaging in the illegal exploitation of minors and to provide child labor victims with appropriate compensation.
• Leverage government contracts to ensure that public dollars do not flow to businesses that consistently violate child labor laws.

At a time of alarming increases in child labor violations, Minnesota has the capacity to align our laws with the value we place on children’s lives. The measures outlined in this report offer the North Star State a guide to ensuring youth employment serves as a positive force, building pathways to a brighter future rather than barriers to well-being.