Rural kids and parents are angry about a new Labor Department rule banning kids from doing farm chores on account of child labor laws. According to the Daily Caller:
The Department of Labor is poised to put the finishing touches on a rule that would apply child-labor laws to children working on family farms, prohibiting them from performing a list of jobs on their own families’ land. …
The new regulations, first proposed August 31 by Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, would also revoke the government’s approval of safety training and certification taught by independent groups like 4-H and FFA, replacing them instead with a 90-hour federal government training course.
The consequences for the new rule may be severe, according to the Daily Caller:
In Kansas, Cherokee County Farm Bureau president Jeff Clark was out in the field—literally on a tractor—when TheDC reached him. He said if Solis’s regulations are implemented, farming families’ labor losses from their children will only be part of the problem.
"What would be more of a blow," he said, "is not teaching our kids the values of working on a farm."
The Environmental Protection Agency reports that the average age of the American farmer is now over 50.