Gingrich: Laws preventing child labor are 'truly stupid' [View All]

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

Source: CNN

(CNN) - Newt Gingrich proposed a plan Friday that would allow poor children to clean their schools for money, saying such a setup would both allow students to earn income and endow them with a strong work ethic.

Speaking at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, the former House Speaker said his system would be an improvement on current child labor laws, which he called "truly stupid."

"It is tragic what we do in the poorest neighborhoods, entrapping children in child laws which are truly stupid," Gingrich said. "Saying to people you shouldn't go to work before you're 14, 16. You're totally poor, you're in a school that's failing with a teacher that's failing."

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"I tried for years to have a very simple model. These schools should get rid of unionized janitors, have one master janitor, pay local students to take care of the school. The kids would actually do work; they'd have cash; they'd have pride in the schools. They'd begin the process of rising."

Read more: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/11/19/gingrich-laws-preventing-child-labor-are-truly-stupid/

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Leave it to Newt to use one speech to both propose a throwback to the workhouses of Dickensian England and attack school janitors as some kind of cushy elite.


"No second helping of porridge for you, Oliver Twist! Now go scrub the toilets in the boys room!"