Child Labor was a Ghastly Result of the Industrial Revolution

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EVOLUTION OF CHILD LABOR
Child labor has come to be regarded as a ghastly by-product of the industrial revolution. The cruelty described in much of the historical literature has made the employment of children the industrial revolution’s most despised feature.
Poverty is the root cause of child labor. Parents send their children for work to earn money for household survival. The entire family is working to run their lives. This popular argument makes banning child labor lose much of its force. The market has been treating child labor as a cheaply available human resource that can be exploited to extract unskilled labor at almost no cost. Many organizations replace their adult labor force with child labor to reduce costs. This has led to new cheaply available child labor market.
Child labor has been a persistent problem throughout the world. Even in the presence of laws and restrictions, many children that live in undeveloped countries do work and that leaves them open to exploitation from small garages to large corporations.

CURRENT SCENARIO IN INDIA
India, an IT giant and the world's second-fastest growing major economy, has millions of children all under 14 years of age, some as young as 4 or 5, and all toiling hard just to get a square meal to keep body and soul from parting company. Child labor is a dagger through India's soul. With an estimated 30% of the world's working kids living in India, the country has the dubious distinction of being home to the largest child labor force in the world.
Today millions of children work as laborers in various businesses in India. You find children being exploited in garages, hotels, construction sites, etc mainly used for low skilled work. These kids have the burden of working to hel...

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...e a brighter future and eradicate child labor.

CONCLUSION
Employers have always capitalized on the cheap child labor available to reduce their costs. This does not make it morally or ethically right for companies to exploit children. Companies like Nike and Hershey need to lead by example. The government should enforce and practice stringent actions against violators. If laws are not enforced, then child slavery will continue and these children will be deprived of the simple joys of childhood.
Child labor can be eradicated only when people realize that it is unethical to support child labor. More than the laws and punishments, people should be true to their conscious and make voluntary efforts to make sure that every child gets to enjoy their childhood and get the right environment to grow into good healthy citizens of our country and bring glory to our nation.

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