Child Labour - Social Studies

Child Labour is when children work regular or additional labour. This is considered abuse and exploitation of children to many countries and international organizations. Child labour started for the purpose of making as much money for the companies and paying as little money to the workers as possible. To do this, the companies take children and make them work agonizing hours, and pay them little. With all of this attention on the subject and all though it is so clear that what is happening here is wrong, why is it that nothing is being done about it? It is clear the child labour is violating the children’s rights, and yet it still continues.

According to the Declaration of Human Rights, children should be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that can be dangerous or that can interfere with the child’s education, or that can be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development. In most cases, the work that children have to do in third world countries ranges anywhere from factory work, mining, odd jobs and maybe even to the extreme of prostitution. In these jobs they work hard long hours with little to no pay Many of these jobs can be dangerous to the children, which is a violation the their Human Rights. Most of these jobs will also be harmful to these children’s health (for example mining) and most of the children working do not attend school. The majority of child labour goes on in third world countries.