I mean, teens are capable of doing a lot of things, but operating heavy machinery shouldn't be on the list, seeing as how someone got killed in a forklift accident just this Tuesday.
What's funny is that everyone else over 18 in the warehouse/factory will then have to apply for a Working With Children Check if they'll be supervising.
@Klaatu_Veratta_Nectarine @vozoto
They want to let them drive tractor trailers here now...
😳😳😳
@InvaderGzim @Klaatu_Veratta_Nectarine @vozoto
We give 16yr olds drivers licenses and put 18yrs olds in charge of 65 ton Main Battle Tanks.
@Render @Klaatu_Veratta_Nectarine @vozoto
Sure. But those 16s normally only drive cars.
And those 18s aren’t normally on public streets.
@InvaderGzim @Render @Klaatu_Veratta_Nectarine yes, I was going to add teens on farms regularly drive tractors, but that's in a field, on private land, far from anyone else.
@vozoto @InvaderGzim @Render @Klaatu_Veratta_Nectarine In our rural town farm kids drive their tractors to school.
@vozoto And more importantly supervised by their parents who own the equipment and insure it and theoretically at least have a good idea of their kids abilities have trained them and will insure they get their homework done etc. Totally different. @InvaderGzim @Render
@vozoto @InvaderGzim @Render but no corporation would ever take advantage of workers. . .... Stares hard in Amazon warehouse.
@vozoto
When I was in HS in the late 70s, students drove school buses.
@vozoto bingo. It's not that I don't believe teens under 18 are not capable of doing the job, I know they are, I've just seen some terrible things between working ER, agricultural accidents in my own family and working contract for years for OSHA. There is a huge possibility that they would be taken advantage of.
I have never had anything this bad happen to me, but several years ago I was told to unload a dozer cab module from a truck.
These things are built to withstand a fucking mountain falling on them. And all I had was a standard electric sit-down forklift with regular pallet forks on it.
Credit where it’s due, the people who made the wooden pallet this monstrous thing was sat on did a damn good job, because the tips of my forks came short of the balance point of the load by about 3”
And that pallet didn’t fall fall apart until I had gotten it all the way out of the truck but hadn’t lowered it down to the floor yet. Of course.
Oh did I mention my back wheels only had the most tenuous of relationships with the ground at this point? Yeah. Boss said keep going.
So here I am with several tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars of carefully machined, welded, and painted steel, tipping to a 45° angle and slamming into the back of this truck.
I thought I was gonna die from a heart attack, and then I thought I was absolutely going to get fired, but luckily, the guy who drove the truck filed a report that said I was just following instructions despite having expressed concerns.
Because they absolutely did try to fire my ass over that.
Moral of the story: we can’t even trust adult bosses with years of forklift driving experience to know the right way to handle forklifts.
BTW, the PM wants states to allow children (under 18s) to drive forklifts to ease staff shortages.
This is undoubtedly what will happen.