Page:Solution of the Child Labor Problem.djvu/135

128 not without foundation. School teachers in industrial districts say very frankly that there is nothing in the schools for the average boy after he has passed the age of twelve. The same teachers will be just as frank in saying that almost never do boys who have once known the freedom of work return to the discipline of school. The same thing is to a lesser degree true of girls. Without question the school fails to retain the interest of the child. On the other hand, an investigation of prices will show that $1.50 a day (the common labor wage) is not a munificent income for a city family of two adults and several children. The distaste for school life; the attractiveness of street life to dismissed children; and the paucity of common labor incomes are real facts that must be faced in solving the problem of the child worker.

The position of the dismissed child is not improved, and may readily be made worse by the enforcement of modern child labor legislation. The attempt to penalize the employer results in penalizing only the child. Anyone familiar with factory reports knows