Child labor is work that harms children or keeps them from attending school. Around the world and in the U. S., growing gaps between rich and poor in recent decades have forced millions of young children out of school and into work. The International Labor Organization estimates that 215 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 currently work under conditions that are considered illegal, hazardous, or extremely exploitative. Underage children work at all sorts of jobs around the world, usually because they and their families are extremely poor. Large numbers of children work in commercial agriculture, fishing, manufacturing, mining, and domestic service. Some children work in illicit activities like the drug trade and prostitution or other traumatic activities such as serving as soldiers.

Child labor involves at least one of the following characteristics:

• Violates a nation’s minimum age laws
• Threatens children’s physical, mental, or emotional well-being
• Involves intolerable abuse, such as child slavery, child trafficking, debt bondage, forced labor, or illicit activities
• Prevents children from going to school
• Uses children to undermine labor standards

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