NBC News is capping a yearlong investigation of U.S. child labor with the documentary “Slaughterhouse Children,” which includes new information on the death of Duvan Pérez.

A 16-year-old employee who died after getting sucked into equipment at a Mississippi poultry plant got the job using the identity of a 32-year-old man, a new revelation that highlights the ease with which migrant children are finding work in a dangerous industry, and the challenges companies face in trying to evaluate their true ages.

Duvan Pérez, who was hired to clean up at Mar-Jac Poultry in Hattiesburg, which supplies chicken to companies like Chick-fil-A, died on July 14. Within hours of his death, questions about his true age were raised by a local Facebook news site, and he was soon determined to be 16.

It’s illegal for minors to work in slaughterhouses, which the Occupational Safety and Health Administration considers among the most perilous workplaces in the country.

The number of children working illegally has skyrocketed across all industries, according to the Labor Department, nearly doubling since 2019. More than 800 child labor investigations in 47 states are ongoing across industries, according to the agency.

    • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
      42·
      1 year ago

      They do, but in no way it’s a high schooler qualified for it. There’s an inherent risk that I consider all minors to be incapable of consenting to accept. Turn the wrong valve, and you’ll turn a controlled furnace into a raging fire. The operator needs to not only accept and understand that risk, but to keep a cool head and stop a safety incident from happening or getting worse. Having a kid in that position not only jeopardizes their safety, but the safety of everyone else there too.

      When we do hazard analysis and consider the safety measures a plant needs, we don’t usually credit the operators as a layer of safety, but we do assume they have their wits about them when we consider what’s credible to happen. We don’t consider the possibility of them tossing gas onto a fire for instance. I don’t think a kid would do that, but it’s not out of question to think that a kid could accidentally make a situation worse compared to an adult worker.

      Just because you don’t need more than a high school degree for a job didn’t mean the job doesn’t command respect. I find it’s the norm for operators to be way more knowledgeable than the new engineer fresh from college. Their experience gives them an intimate know how that is on par with studying the subject.