This Day in Wall Street History 1915: Minimum working age raised

In South Carolina, the minimum age allowed by law for workers in mills, factories, and mines was raised from 12 to 14 years old.

Before the industrial revolution, children would have been apprenticed or worked as part of a family business. With the advent of the industrial revolution, children were instead forced into in slave-like working conditions in factories and mills.

Child labor became a recognized social problem in the U.S., initially in the eastern and midwestern states following the Civil War, and in the south, which lagged in industrialization, in the early 20th century.

Though child labor was largely curtailed in the U.S. and European countries by the mid-20th century, it is estimated that today child labor makes up between 2 percent and 10 percent of the workforce in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East.

Source: History.com