In many countries children are engaged in different kinds of paid work Some people regard this as completely wrong while others consider it a valuable work experience important for learning and taking responsibility What is your opinion

Some countries of the world have children doing various types of paid work. While many individuals and organizations discourage any form of child labor, others treat paid work by children as a learning process. I believe that engaging children to work for any monetary pay should not be encouraged.

It is a nice thought to teach children the value of money and importance of responsibility through paid work. In an utopian state this might also work wonders. After school hours or during weekends, a child can sell lemonade and cookies in front of his/ her house to understand that money is not easily earned. However, in reality we have governments struggling to cope up with the hunger of malnourished children. Countries are finding it difficult to maintain law and order and even pass an acceptable constitution. In such cases pondering about the best ways to engage children in paid work or formulating strict laws to prevent any exploitation can be a tedious task. In absence of strict governance, the children can be exploited. They can be asked to do much more than what they are paid for. This will not help them learn but add to the burden of existence.

If a child works to earn his/ her daily bread, it is very much possible that the cunning employers will tend to employ more and more children at cheap costs.The children might start to work overtime to earn more. There will be no time for the basic activities like studying and playing which many of us take for granted. The child will not have a childhood. The innocence can be lost between working and waiting to be paid. Poor parents may find it better to have their kids work and add to the income of the family than to send them to school. Without elementary education, the future generation of the country and society at large will be in grave danger.

Additional income for children can also become a cause for bad habits. We are well aware of the ill effects of peer pressure during teenage. If an innocent child sees others using drugs or consuming alcohol, he/ she might feel inclined to try them too. With the limited pocket money provided by parents, it would be difficult to indulge in such habits. However, with an additional and perhaps, unaccounted income, the children might find an easy way to buy and consume such illegal substances.

I, therefore, believe that even though paid work can teach many values to children, it has a greater potential to cause an irreversible damage to the future pillars of the world. It is better to strictly disallow children in any form of paid work than to assume wrongly that someone will not exploit child labor.