An annual rite of summer is seeing Philadelphia and suburban teens flock to the Jersey Shore to earn cash working at boardwalk shops and restaurants. The work can be hard and the hours long, but not as long as they are going to be with the New Jersey Legislature on the verge of allowing businesses to ask older teen employees to work 50-hour shifts. If passed, the bill will also make it harder for parents to object.
The General Assembly has passed the legislation, so it’s up to the state Senate to take the side of children instead of catering to businesses trying to overcome staffing problems linked to the pandemic. Summer may be their make-or-break period, but they shouldn’t be allowed to treat children like laborers in a Victorian workhouse.
The bill, sponsored by Assemblyman Roy Freiman, D-Somerset, and Sen. Vin Gopal, D-Monmouth, would hike the number of hours that 16- and 17-year-olds can work during summer from 40 to 50 hours a week. Their shifts could last up to 10 hours. Shifts for children 14 to 15 years old would increase from five hours to six, with a 30-minute break for a meal.
Currently, children must obtain a separate work permit for each job they seek in New Jersey. Parents must sign the permit application and a school official’s signature is also needed to indicate the job would not interfere with a child’s education. Freiman and Gopal’s bill no longer requires parental consent for minors to apply for a work permit and removes school districts from the permit application process.
The state would instead create a central database with the names of every approved work permit applicant, which employers could refer to when interviewing job applicants. Parental permission won’t be necessary for a teenager to apply for a permit, but the bill says a child’s “caregiver” will receive notification within three days of an application’s receipt and have two weeks to object before the permit would be issued.
Wouldn’t it be simpler to get a parent or guardian’s permission before considering an application that in the end will be rejected because the “caregiver” doesn’t want their child to work?
Unfortunately, New Jersey isn’t alone in trying to survive a labor shortage by hiring more teenagers. Primary Aim, a franchisee of the Wendy’s restaurant chain which operates 76 locations in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio, lowered its hiring age from 16 to 14 last summer. “It’s been a blessing, said Tim Thompson, a Primary Aim executive. “They’re high-energy, hard-working, and they show up because their parents drive them.”
An Arkansas restaurant put its teen workers on the clock an hour before their shifts began last year so they could get paid while doing homework. Does that boss really think his adolescent employees will spend much time actually studying in the hour before their shift begins? His brilliant idea is no more the answer to an adult labor shortage than New Jersey’s winking an eye at child labor laws.
Many adults didn’t go back to their old jobs after their pandemic unemployment benefits ended because they didn’t like where they worked. They want employers to stop paying lip service to workplace complaints and make meaningful changes. That may mean better pay, shorter hours, more breaks, educational incentives, day care options or more pleasant surroundings. Knowing their former bosses think children can take their place won’t bring fed-up workers back.
———
