Fact Sheet #38: Child Labor Rules for Employing Youth in Grocery Stores under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)

Once a youth reaches 18 years of age, he or she is no longer subject to the federal child labor provisions..

Sixteen- and 17-year-olds may be employed for unlimited hours in any occupation other than those declared hazardous by the Secretary of Labor. Examples of equipment declared hazardous in food service establishments include:

Power-driven meat and poultry processing machines (meat slicers, meat saws, patty forming machines, meat grinders, and meat choppers), commercial mixers and certain power-driven bakery machines. Employees under 18 years of age are not permitted to operate, feed, set-up, adjust, repair, or clean any of these machines or their disassembled parts

Motor Vehicles. Generally, no employee under 18 years of age may drive on the job or serve as an outside helper on a motor vehicle on a public road, but 17-year-olds who meet certain specific requirements may drive automobiles and trucks that do not exceed 6,000 pounds gross vehicle weight for limited amounts of time as part of their job. Such minors are, however, prohibited from making time sensitive deliveries (such as pizza deliveries or other trips where time is of the essence) and from driving at night. (See See Fact Sheet #34: Child Labor Provision and the Driving of Automobiles and Trucks under the Fair Labor Standard Act.)

• outside school hours; school hours are determined by the local public school in the area the minor is residing while employed;
• no more than 3 hours on a school day, including Fridays;
• no more than 8 hours on a nonschool day;
• no more than 18 hours during a week when school is in session;
• no more that 40 hours during a week when school is not in session;
• between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.-except between June 1 and Labor day when the evening hour is extended to 9 p.m.



 
• They may perform cashiering, shelf stocking, and the bagging and carrying out of customer orders.
• They may perform clean up work, including the use of vacuum cleaners and floor waxers.
• They may perform limited cooking duties involving electric or gas grills that do not entail cooking over an open flame. They may also cook with deep fat fryers that are equipped with and utilize devices that automatically raise and lower the "baskets" into and out of the hot grease of oil. They may not operate NEICO broilers, rotisseries, pressure cookers, fryolators, high-speed ovens, or rapid toasters.
• They may not perform any baking activities.
• They may not work in warehousing or load or unload goods to or from trucks or conveyors.
• They may not operate, clean, set up, adjust, repair or oil power driven machines including food slicers, grinders, processors, or mixers.
• They may clean kitchen surfaces and non-power-driven equipment, and filter, transport and dispose of cooking oil, but only when the temperature of the surface and oils do not exceed 100º F.
• They may not operate power-driven lawn mowers or cutters, or load or unload goods to or from trucks or conveyors.
• They may not work in freezers or meat coolers, but they may occasionally enter a freezer momentarily to retrieve items.
• They are prohibited from working in any of the Hazardous Orders (discussed above for 16- and 17-year-olds).

Children under 14 years of age may not be employed in non-agricultural occupations covered by the FLSA, including food service establishments. Permissible employment for such children is limited to work that is exempt from the FLSA (such as delivering newspapers to the consumer and acting). Children may also perform work not covered by the FLSA such as completing minor chores around private homes or casual baby-sitting.