Well that’s the funny thing. What defines a child laborer? Most people know that there’s a difference between a 16 year old working the odd summer job and a Victorian 9 year old chimney sweep. But the historical memory of the chimney sweep is deservedly strong. It reminds us that for most of the history of capitalism, when guardrails don’t exist, children get exploited. Firms will act according to incentives and will push children, lacking experience and a voice, to do backbreaking and dangerous work. They’ll do it aided by rhetoric like yours, brushing aside the erasure of the robust edifice of labor laws that protected our young people in the name of “character building.”