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As GOP Erodes Child Labor Laws, Alabama Roofer Fined Just $117K for Teen's Worksite Death
"It's unconscionable that roofing companies hire 15-year-olds," said one labor expert—but in state after state and even at the federal level, lawmakers are rolling back restrictions on teen workers.
Feb 07, 2024
Workers' rights advocates on Wednesday decried a meager fine for an Alabama contractor that illegally employed a 15-year-old boy who died on the job, a move that came amid a push by Republicans at the federal and state level to roll back child labor protections.
The U.S. Department of Labor fined Pelham, Alabama-based Apex Roofing & Restoration $117,175 in civil penalties for violation of child labor laws resulting in the July 1, 2019 death of a 15-year-old Guatemalan worker during his first day on the job in Cullman, 50 miles north of Birmingham.
The teen—who could not be identified because he was a minor—fell through insulation and plunged 35-50 feet to his death on a concrete floor inside the building on which he was working,
according to a Cullman Tribunereport at the time.
The Labor Department's Wage and Hour Division found that the company's employment of the teen violated a provision of the Fair Labor Standards Act that prohibits workers under the age of 18 from doing dangerous jobs including roofing or construction.
"Apex Roofing risked the life of a child by employing him to work on a roof in violation of federal child labor laws, leaving relatives and friends to grieve an unnecessary and preventable tragedy," Wage and Hour Administrator Jessica Looman said in a statement.
The Labor Department action came shortly after the Alabama Policy Institute, a right-wing think tank, published its annual agenda. The document advocates rolling back limits on 14- and 15-year-olds in the workplace.
An Apex Roofing spokesperson told Common Dreams:
We at Apex Roofing & Restoration are truly heartbroken by the senseless death of a minor at a job site in 2019. The tragic incident occurred when a subcontractor's worker brought his sibling to a worksite without Apex's knowledge or permission.
Apex has a long-standing policy prohibiting any form of child labor. In addition, since that accident, Apex has implemented a number of measures to further strengthen job site security and safety. Our hearts are with this family and any family who suffers a loss.
Common Dreamsreported last year that congressional Democrats implored the Labor Department to act following a Reuters investigation that found dozens of chidren as young as 12 years old—most of them Central American migrants—working in Alabama and Georgia factories supplying the Korean auto giant Hyundai.
Across the country, Republican state lawmakers have been advancing legislation to remove restrictions on child labor, despite several high-profile workplace deaths of minors.
At the federal level, Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho) and Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) last year introduced a bill that would allow 16- and 17-year-olds to work in the logging industry.
Major corporations including McDonald's, Costco, Starbucks, Amazon-owned Whole Foods, and PepsiCo have said they're taking steps to tackle child labor in their supply chains, The New York Timesreported Wednesday.
Whole Foods said in a statement that it has "been actively evolving our focus on the risk of migrant child labor domestically."
According to Labor Department data, the number of minors employed in violation of child labor laws soared by 283% from 2015 to 2022. Over that same period, the number of minors employed in violation of hazardous occupation orders rose 94%.
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UAW Chief Says Autoworkers Will 'Run Through a Brick Wall' for Better Life
Nonunion workers "want their fair share of social and economic justice," he said as the UAW backed union-busting charges against car companies in three states.
Dec 11, 2023
Citing automakers' "aggressive anti-union campaigns," nonunion employees organizing with the United Auto Workers on Monday announced unfair labor practices charges against three major international car companies operating in the United States.
Workers at Honda in Indiana, Hyundai in Alabama, and Volkswagen in Tennessee filed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) charges against management at the three companies "for illegally union busting as workers organize to join the UAW."
"They're not gonna bully us and we're not gonna back down from 'em."
"We are filing an unfair labor practice charge against Honda because of management illegally telling us to remove union stickers from our hats, and for basically threatening us with write-ups," Honda worker Josh Cupit explains in a video released Monday by More Perfect Union.
"It's essentially to show Honda that we know what our rights are and that they're not gonna bully us and we're not gonna back down from 'em," Cupit added. "And we know that they are in the wrong."
According to UAW, "Honda workers report being targeted and surveilled by management for pro-union activity" at the company's plant in Greensburg, Indiana.
"Hundreds of workers at the facility have signed union cards and are organizing to join the UAW," the union said.
At Volkswagen's factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, "management has harassed and threatened workers for talking about the union; confiscated and destroyed pro-union materials in the break room; attempted to intimidate and illegally silence pro-union workers; and has attempted to illegally prohibit workers from distributing union literature and discussing union issues in non work areas on nonwork time."
UAW said that management at Hyundai's Montgomery, Alabama plant "unlawfully confiscated, destroyed, and prohibited pro-union materials in nonwork areas during nonwork times" as "hundreds of workers continue to sign up to win their union despite this illegal interference and intimidation."
UAW President Shawn Fain said Monday during a livestreamed speech announcing the NLRB filing that "there's one thing that sets apart winning and losing organizing campaigns: The workers have to want it. And right now, America's autoworkers are ready. They want a better life. They want a voice on the job. They want their fair share of social and economic justice. And they don't just want it, they're ready to run through a brick wall to get it."
"Right now, thousands of workers at 13 auto companies are fighting for a better life with the UAW... From California to South Carolina, from Illinois to Alabama, these workers are making history, and I've never seen anything like it in my work life," he added. "Last Thursday, workers at Volkswagen in Chattanooga announced that over 1,000 of them had signed cards to join UAW in less than a week, and in just a few days since, hundreds more have signed up."
Fain continued:
This summer, while we were in the thick of bargaining with the Big Three, we started noticing something unusual: First they came one or two at a time, autoworkers reaching out to us from nonunion companies about what they were seeing at the Big Three. Then they started coming by the dozens. They'd write in, saying their companies had record profits, just like the Big Three and they felt they deserved record contracts, just like the UAW autoworkers at Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis.
From every company, autoworkers weren't just writing us messages, they were signing union cards.
"The only way we unite in this fight against corporate greed is through a union contract," the UAW president added. "Not just for the Big Three, but for autoworkers everywhere."
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House Dems Urge Biden Administration to Rid Hyundai Supply Chain of Child Labor
The call from congressional lawmakers comes amid a surge in child labor violations—and as Republican state lawmakers seek to roll back over a century of child labor protections.
Feb 11, 2023
A group of 33 Democratic lawmakers on Friday implored the U.S. Labor Department "to take immediate action to rid Hyundai's supply chain of child labor and hold those responsible to the fullest extent of the law" after a Reuters investigation revealed that dozens of kids as young as 12 years old—most of them Central American migrants—were working in Southeastern factories supplying the Korean auto giant.
Last July, Reuters began investigating allegations of children working on the factory floor at Hyundai subsidiary SMART Alabama LLC's metal stamping plant in Luverne after a 13-year-old Guatemalan girl who worked there temporarily went missing. Reporters Joshua Schneyer, Mica Rosenberg, and Kristina Cooke reported that children, the youngest of whom were 12 years old, worked at the plant, which supplies parts for vehicles manufactured at Hyundai's flagship U.S. factory in Montgomery.
Reuters subsequently found dozens of children working in at least four major suppliers to Kia and Hyundai—its parent company—in Alabama and Georgia. After a Labor Department probe found that one of the suppliers, SL Alabama LLC, violated the Fair Labor Standards Act by engaging in "oppressive child labor," the agency obtained a federal court order to stop the firm from illegally employing 13-, 14,- and 15-year-old workers.
"Clearly, there is a systemic effort within the Hyundai supply chain to recruit child labor from abroad, undermining workers in other parts of the U.S. auto industry."
"New reports allege additional automotive parts suppliers for Hyundai, mainly in Alabama, are also suspected of child labor violations," the 33 congressional Democrats wrote in a letter to U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh led by Rep. Daniel Kildee (D-Mich.) decrying the "abhorrent" crimes.
"Many of these children are immigrants recruited from Central America, working under fake names in dangerous conditions in manufacturing plants, some driving forklifts and operating welding equipment, and receiving serious workplace injuries," the lawmakers wrote.
The letter continued:
According to reports, children are actively recruited from Central America and employed through third-party staffing agencies in an attempt to cover up these disturbing activities [and] when adult workers in the plants tried to raise concerns about children working there, they were ignored. This is shocking, disturbing, and has no place in the U.S.
Earlier this year, Hyundai publicly committed to severing ties with its suppliers in its U.S. supply chain that were found to use child labor. We are concerned that Hyundai, at DOL's suggestion, reversed course on this commitment and will not cut ties with its Alabama suppliers that use child labor. Clearly, there is a systemic effort within the Hyundai supply chain to recruit child labor from abroad, undermining workers in other parts of the U.S. auto industry. And it must be addressed immediately.
Hyundai said in a statement that the company "agrees that child labor is entirely unacceptable," but that it was "disappointed" the lawmakers' letter did not mention the "comprehensive actions we have taken in collaboration with the Department of Labor to address the allegations of underage workers at certain suppliers."
Rep. Terri Sewell (D-Ala), who did not sign the letter, toldReuters earlier this week that she has repeatedly discussed the child labor issue with Hyundai officials, and that she has "made clear that the use of child labor is abhorrent and unacceptable, and that there must be accountability."
Last year, attorneys representing Lea Reis, a California woman, filed a class-action lawsuit against Hyundai on behalf of Hyundai owners and lessees "seeking to stop and prevent" the company's "illegal use of child labor."
SMART Alabama LLC is also the target of a class-action lawsuit alleging the company "cheated the United States immigration system" to employ adult Mexican immigrants, who worked "horrendously long hours" for a fraction of the pay of U.S. workers.
The lawmakers' letter comes as Republican-led state legislatures work to roll back child labor protections, even as the Labor Department's Wage and Hour Division reported a 37% surge in child labor violations in 2022. These included 688 minors found to be working in hazardous occupations.
"It's just crazy to me that we are re-litigating a lot of things that seem to have been settled 100, 120, or 140 years ago."
In addition to Hyundai and Kia, child labor violations have recently been exposed at major companies in the U.S. including Brazilian meatpacking giant JBS, Chipotle, Dunkin' Donuts, and McDonalds, as well as at a host of smaller businesses.
Yet, in Iowa—to name but one example—Republican state lawmakers want to change child labor laws so teens as young as 14 could work in previously prohibited and dangerous jobs including mining, logging, and animal slaughtering.
"It's just crazy to me that we are re-litigating a lot of things that seem to have been settled 100, 120, or 140 years ago," Charlie Wishman, president of the Iowa AFL-CIO—which opposes the GOP bill—toldThe Guardian.
"All of these protections have been put in place for a reason," Wishman added. "Child labor law is there to make sure that kids are working in age-appropriate work activities or occupations that are appropriate for their age. We think this is a rewrite of our child labor laws in Iowa that [is] going way, way, way too far and has the potential to put kids in dangerous situations."
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