Re: Not really

1) Pay no attention to the War on Lemonade.

Did every child laborer run a (voluntary) lemonade stand?

2) Why is this always the argument? (not from you, admittedly, but I see this repeated over and over with no basis) Who seriously believes that farm and factory child labor would return to the USA if child labor was legal and school not compulsory? (And before someone says "I do", let me address you - whoever seriously believes that has no idea about world economics)

Summarizing - even if true, that doesn't make the argument hold across time.

It wasn't the point that this would be the case now if child labor laws were dropped. My point was that this notion that Industrial Age child laborers were working because they all wanted to be there is bunk. Most of them were forced to work either by their parents or by circumstances. And the reason they were allowed to work wasn't because society respected their rights; quite the opposite actually. They were cheap labor and easy to control.