Talk to a father about why his progeny plays sports and he may light up. His child may not get much play time nor play at an especially elite level - the kid may even kick up more grass than goals - but sports build character. Players learn about teamwork and responsibility, the discipline of setting and achieving goals, and perseverance through disappointment. Sports offer the opportunity to demonstrate leadership and practice time management. Sports keep kids focused and out of trouble. And of course sports keep kids moving (at least during practice, benchwarmers might note). All of these qualities teach life lessons and set kids up eventually for employability.
Of course, so does being employed. Athletics and arts may be fun - or not (imagine loving one and being forced to participate in the other) - but they lead to lots of dreams and very little employment in those actual fields. Children are encouraged, often pressured, to take on extracurriculars for alleged intrinsic benefits, for the entertainment of parents (and/or daycare until they get off work themselves), for the employment of a particular class of teachers, and for the arbitrary amusement of college admissions officers. How many teenagers are given an honest choice to directly benefit from their own (“child”) labor by getting paid? How many schools make it as easy to sign up for jobs as they do for teams?
In the fairly recent past, children have transitioned from being family assets to liabilities (or more kindly, luxuries): whereas today parents wearily ask “can we really afford another?”, the farmers who dominated yesteryear wanted more cheap family labor who might survive to adulthood. Modern childhood reflects a rich society’s triumph of consumerism over production and we’ve gone too far in indulging a very particular fantasy of late childhood that hardly resembles or prepares for adulthood. Rather than figuring out what exactly teenagers are capable of doing that is worth paying for or acculturating them to adulthood, we subsidize a New Deal of make-work for them to spend time with same-age peers until they reach 18, whereupon most are encouraged to take on debt for a 4+ year vacation from responsibility whose bureaucracy screens for ideological purity and then dispatches them into many jobs that don’t require a college degree in the first place. Adulthood is finally (hopefully) achieved sometime in their twenties where they finally get a taste of the labor market and paying the taxes to support the system. Alternatively, teens “graduate” as unskilled laborers from high schools whose academic standards have been dropping by the decade!
Figure 1. Sports do solve for a problem of arts: in both cases you are paying (personally and/or as taxpayer) for the privilege of your child participating. For arts, how do you know if your kid is any good? Unrelated adults rarely partake in school performances; most politely clap for anything. When I was in high school, I was annoyed at the low quality of the student newspaper, which I intuited would be published regardless of quality or consumer demand. But sports have scores. Your individual child’s talent can be obscured on a team, all the more if your division is pitiful, but there is real feedback. And yet the arts often have a more transferable skill set. Solution? Explore what your child can do for pay instead of what people will do for your pay. Alternatively, I’m willing to accept payment to tell your kids they’re great at whatever you want.
When you review the case against teenagers working, you see arguments that it interferes with academics (because they have limited time and may be tired - but this is true of any extracurricular.) Others argue that work interferes with other extracurriculars (which begs the question). In theory, of course, teenagers could be working less than ever before because the jobs immediately available to them are low-skilled and they are developing higher skills. But in reality the average American teen spends over 3 hours a day consuming screen leisure (television, social media, video games), which only so often demonstrate a culture of work (not to mention faithful marriage). Parents complain about the burden of homework but time studies suggest that teens spend less time on homework than sports (each about 45 minutes a day). Perhaps your own (grand)kids are different. I’ll be the first to admit that “traditional” extracurriculars are a better use of time than screens - but are they the best if you’re already encouraging them to do something different? East Asian children spend hours more on academics (and practically nothing on sports while ironically enjoying a lower rate of obesity).
Let’s not neglect the dignity of work! The average teen is spending 26 minutes a day in paid employment, down from 57 minutes a day in the mid-1990s. But the average is misleading. According to Jason Riley at the Wall Street Journal,
“The labor-force participation rate for teenagers has been falling for more than 40 years, and the decline in the past two decades has been especially sharp. In 1978, labor-force participation among 16- to 19-year-olds was nearly 60%, and 20 years later it was still above 50%. Today, it’s only 37%, even while job openings are as plentiful as ever.”
We should also be blunt about the fact that some kids hate school. The economist David Henderson argues that by any plain understanding of the words, mandatory school consists of “forced child labor” - children, under penalty of law, are required to show up and work (without compensation!). Of course some kids love school and they should be able to make the most of it - all the easier if the kids who hate school aren’t present. There’s extraordinary bizarreness in arguing that kids should not work a job in high school so they can get a degree to go work the same exact job. But America has an excess of degrees, forcing everyone to pursue more, as demonstrated in Bryan Caplan’s the Case Against Education. The tragedy is that what employers get out of our “education” system - finding intelligent people who can finish something they start and conform to standards - can be screened through employment as well (which, of course, is productive rather than consumptive).
Figure 2. The Peter Thiel Fellowship merely encouraged college dropouts and didn’t reach nearly far enough into the education system
And indeed why shouldn’t school consist of insights into a variety of professions? The award-winning teacher John Taylor Gatto used to give kids time off from class to go pursue “apprenticeships” around New York City. Many schools require “community service” that just extends unpaid child labor - a school determined to prepare its charges for the future may very well require a paid job. An especially ambitious school system (or one with a low rate of sending kids off to college) might drop hours or school days to accommodate (or require) employment. Schools could partner with the local Chamber of Commerce to find age-appropriate part time jobs or even be a hub for employers: why not screen your local high school website for prospective baby sitters? For that matter, why shouldn’t schools retain older children to look after younger? Knowing what employers are actually prepared to pay for should inform the curriculum - in certain areas, shop class or something else to accommodate trades may return; in many places, English may trend toward professional writing. The point is: if school is supposed to train you for a job, there is no training like doing the job.
Figure 3. Imagine knowing nothing about adult society but trying to figure it out on the basis of how our high school students spend their time. There must be a heavy literary analysis sector! Every adult, daily, must use the quadratic formula, likely as a morning greeting ritual. 'Good morning, Skip! What’s the discriminant today?' Or perhaps they do so in Spanish. The official workday ends at 3 pm but much planning has to happen for elaborate galas.
Then there’s the whimsical sense of a lost childhood, a longing to spare these babes from the vagaries of the world (and capitalism). But how long does “childhood” extend (and how does screen time fit into the romance)? While we don’t have especially good terms for minors close to adulthood - even “teenager” is a modern term that carries a connotation of irresponsibility foreign to previous generations of that age range - these days immaturity extends well into people’s twenties. When you think of a 16 or 17 year old, are you horrified by the prospect of their “child labor”? The term is prejudicial propaganda designed to evoke in your mind coal-stained faces of preteens. But even working in the coal mines was decreasingly a thing when child labor was completely legal. Bear in mind, of course, that for better or worse, workforce safety is heavily regulated today. When you find an article about children found working in some deplorable condition in the United States, just imagine (an easily found article about an) adult found working in a deplorable condition in the United States - and then the recommendation that therefore it should be illegal to employ anyone in any profession.
Bryan Caplan says:
“People in the First World have an irrational horror of the very idea of child labor. Yes, kids endure some horrible jobs. But kids also endure some horrible schools. We should focus on typical job and school experiences, not living nightmares. There’s no reason why kids, poor and rich alike, shouldn’t be allowed – indeed encouraged – to enter the labor market part-time to earn their own money and gain valuable work experience.”
The dignity of work extends beyond the tangible rewards of a paycheck or the mastery of a profession. At its core, work is an affirmation of our shared humanity, an embodiment of our drive to contribute, create, and impact the world around us. The challenges and triumphs encountered in our tasks teach us resilience, discipline, and the value of perseverance. Each task, whether monumental or modest, is a testament to human tenacity and the deep-rooted desire to leave an indelible mark on society. In this light, work is not just a means to an end but a profound expression of our individual identities, imbued with purpose and meaning that elevates our daily endeavors to a tapestry of shared experiences and achievements.
In our next correspondence, I’ll relate the history of how child labor came to be regulated in the United States but I’ll conclude here by saying that you as a (grand)parent can get serious about preparing your (grand)child for the real world of paid work and enlisting them as a co-creator in shaping the world. Even if you have the highest ambitions for an intellectually demanding career they can’t immediately pursue: Arrange for your child to meet real professionals actually doing their work, especially in fields that you’d like to encourage and/or that especially interest your children. Bringing your daughter to work can and should be more than an obligatory random day that happens one time. Get creative about getting them engaged as helpers, assistants, interns, and real employees. Give your child the opportunity to test their mettle on the marketplace. There’s a famous New Yorker cartoon whose caption is “On the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog” - lots of Upwork projects can be done by your kids on a screen rather than consuming leisure. And, of course, if you have the opportunity to hire unrelated teens to mow your lawn or show them what you do for a living, please do! You might also change the culture: don’t just ask kids “what do you want to be when you grow up?” Ask: “What are you doing these days after school for money?”
Figure 4. Here are three books worth reading that are bank-shots to the topic of this correspondence. The Case Against Education is a splendid polemic on how school distinguishes prospective employees without providing actual education (I’ve reviewed it previously here). So Good They Can’t Ignore You laments the standard advice for people to follow their passion and instead encourages people of all ages to pursue what they’re good at. And Dumbing Us Down is a public teacher’s critique of trapping kids inside a classroom.
Figure 5. I’ll be talking more about these two more in the next email; neither focus exclusively on child labor but each has an excellent essay about the history of child labor. Ironically, Ayn Rand’s contributions to Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal are the weakest.
Figure 6. Children’s book recommendations seem especially suitable for this topic. The Creator in You is excellent - about how God worked and how you are made in His image to continue His work. Alternatively, my son’s favorite book right now, requiring at least daily readings, is A is for Abundance, a great rhyming alphabetical guide to capitalism.
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, forward it to a friend: know any potential employers of teenagers? How about any parents or grandparents? Or perhaps someone who was once a child themselves?
For more, check out my archive of writings, including Why homeschool?
If you’ve received this email from a friend and would like more, sign up at www.grantreadsbooks.com or shoot me an email at grant@grantstarrett.com with the subject “Subscribe.” I read over 100 non-fiction books a year (history, business, self-management) and share a review (and terrible cartoons) every couple weeks with my friends. Really, it’s all about how to be a better American and how America can be better. Look forward to having you on board!