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In the early 1990s, a young boy from Pakistan, Iqbal Masih, began a crusade with the Bonded Labor Liberation Front (BLLF), to stop child labor in his country. Like most countries, laws forbidding child labor had been written by the Pakistani government. However, many large businesses played such powerful and influential roles in the country that these laws were not enforced. Therefore, many children who were between the ages of 5 and 17, and were not of working age, were forced to work in terrible and sometimes deadly conditions. Many of these conditions resulted in the children being starved, abused and overworked.
Iqbal was one of these children. After escaping from his ordeal at the age of 10, he set out to help other children in his country become free from bondage. One of the ways he did this was by speaking to people in other countries and teaching them about the horrific working conditions for the children of Pakistan. Unfortunately, to this day, these conditions still remain . However, thanks to Iqbal, the BLLF, and other organizations, awareness has now been raised and circumstances are in the process of improving for children.
While child labor is not something new, nor has it been completely resolved, it is a very important topic that needs to be discussed with students. Child labor has been in the spotlight for many years, not only in the United States, but in many other countries. Currently, statistics show that nearly 246 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 are forced to work, many times in hazardous or deadly conditions.
At the last United States census, the population of America was 306 million people (www.census.gov/, 2009), so the total number of children who are forced to work is eighty percent of the population of America. Child labor first began playing a significant role in the economy of the United States during the Industrial Revolution, when poor families living in big cities relied on their children to help bring home a paycheck to feed their families . Another example during this time were farmers who relied on their children for help on the farm. When Child Labor Laws were adopted in the United States, children began to see less responsibility...