For parents, it may be hard to understand why their child isn’t employed this summer or during the school year; they remember their own teenage years working at local stores and diners. Did the kids just not want a job? Are children this lazy?
The answer is no: one of the hardest things for a high school student to obtain in this economic climate is a job – summer or otherwise.
Few teens employed
Thousands of high school and college students begin the search for employment but come back empty-handed. According to the Department of U.S. Labor and Statistics, only 22 percent of teens enrolled in high school are employed.
South Carolina’s Department of Employment and Workforce’s data indicates that of the 47,365 15- to 19-year-old residents in Greenville in 2012, only 4,675 of teenagers 14- to 18- years old were employed.
Nationally, “the effective unemployment rate for 18-29 year olds, which adjusts for labor force participation by including those who have given up looking for work, is 16.1 percent,” according to the June 2013 Millennial Jobs Report released by Generation Opportunity, a national, non-partisan youth advocacy organization.
“The declining labor force participation rate has created an additional 1.7 million young adults that are not counted as ‘unemployed’ by the U.S. Department of Labor because they are not in the labor force, meaning that those young people have given up looking for work due to the lack of jobs,” the report said.
Minor restrictions
A problem for teenaged job seekers is that many of the jobs that appear available for teens actually aren’t due to Child Labor Law dictates. These restrictions limit not only the number of hours teens can work, but also what jobs they can apply for.
The state restricts minors aged 14 to 15 to “cashiering, serving food, custodial duties, bussing tables, car washing, and delivery work not involving the operation of a motor vehicle,” according to South Carolina Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation (SCLLR) website.
Minors ages 16 to 17 are restricted from any jobs considered hazardous, including construction, machine and factory jobs, according to the Hazardous Occupations Orders of the Fair Labor Standards Act. Lastly, many restaurants have limited jobs for teenagers under age 18 because they cannot serve alcohol, and employees must be 21 to pour alcohol.
Increased liability
According to U.S. Department of Labor, each violation of child labor laws can carry up to $10,000 in fines.
“Hiring teens under the age of 18 years old has a lot of liability risks,” said Clemson City Administrator Rick Cotton. Within the Clemson city limits, “The only jobs for minors are as camp counselors, and they are supervised by adults constantly,” he said.
Resume building
Another factor for young adults is competition for higher education. Instead of having the summer to make money and have fun, some students are spending their summers at camps and participating in programs to improve their resumes for college admission.
Improving jobs scene
Job opportunities may be few and far between for teenagers, but summer jobs and part-time jobs are often the first exposure to the workplace and can have a positive effect on future career earnings, according to the Employment Policies Institute.
Recent evidence suggests there may be hope for future summers; South Carolina Department of Employment and Workforce (DEW) announced in April that unemployment rates hit their lowest point since 2008.
