[AT] DOL regulations discussion continued

[Ron Cook]

You have to vote the progressives out or we will all be gone.  Way too 
many regulations already in effect and more and more coming down the pike.

Ron Cook
Salix, IA


On 1/16/2012 3:28 PM, Grant Brians wrote:
> As an active farmer and having children, I have a keen interest in the new
> proposed regulations restricting minors from most ag occupations. I found
> the best articulation of the basics of the issue in this Western Farm Press
> online article:
>
> http://westernfarmpress.com/government/grange-stands-against-proposed-child-
> labor-regulations
>
> A point which has been generally lost is that if a family farm is
> incorporated or a partnership in LEGAL structure, then by the DOL new
> definitions, it is no longer subject to the family exemption. Another issue
> is that there has become a lack of understanding that if kids are visiting
> their parents in a farm field (say when the family lives on or adjacent to
> the farm) that they are not "working" for the farm.
>
> Another issue which is highlighted well in the Farm Press Grange article, is
> one that would have applied to me as a young teenager. I learned how to move
> irrigation pipe, drive certain tractors, plant vegetables with preceision
> planters (all of which has been extremely useful to me as a farmer both
> during my teens and since) by working for the farmer who initially rented
> the land we moved to. I was 13 and 14 years old, far below the "allowed age"
> in these new regulations, but yet those experiences were really useful and
> very good for me. Our children have friends who are clamoring to do things
> on the farm because they want to learn, but I cannot let them do because the
> regulations we currently have that are looser than the proposed ones
> prohibit me allowing them to do so! There is no economic benefit to me to
> teach these kids, but I would do so because it is the right thing to do!
> Where will the next generation of farmers come from?
>
> Sigh.
>          Grant Brians
>          Hollister,California farmer
>
> _______________________________________________
> AT mailing list
> http://www.antique-tractor.com/mailman/listinfo/at
>