The Effects Of Child Labor During The Industrial Revolution

The children who worked in the factories during the Industrial Revolution lived a hard life. They suffered from abuse, inhumane working condition, and unfair wages. They were forced into dangerous work and worked for excessive lengths at a time. These children were working to provide for themselves and their family while sacrificing their childhood. The children that worked in these factories were treated as animals. They were beaten for minor infractions and punished for being worked to exhaustion. These children were made to get to work in the early hours of the morning and did not return home until late into the night. Though they did not receive sufficient sleep, they were expected to work for extensive lengths of time without breaks. They suffered physically from the beatings they received if they failed to be on time for work. They were torn down emotionally because they were unable to see their parents or siblings. They woke up so early in the morning to be at the factories on time that they could not spend time with their families. They also suffered emotionally from the pressure they were put under to work constantly from morning till night. A young child of about five years old simply cannot hold up under the pressure nor should they have …show more content…
While the parents did not commend the ideas of their children working in the dangerous conditions, most of the time they had no choice but to consent to child labor because they needed the extra money. A series of laws were passed to help control child labor. The first was the Factory Act. This act, passed in 1833, put a limit on the amount of hours children could work in a day. Children below the age of nine were not permitted to work at all while children ranging in age from nine to thirteen could only work a maximum of eight hours per day. Ages fourteen to eighteen were only allowed to work for twelve hours a