Insights · Wage and hour

5.8% of DOL wage cases had child labor violations in fiscal 2025

Groundwork research · Published October 11, 2026 · Updated October 20, 2026 · Data as of July 14, 2026 · 5 min read

DOL found child labor violations in 976 of the 16,924 cases it concluded in fiscal 2025, 5.8%. In fiscal 2016 the figure was 633 of 28,589, 2.2%. Below: how the share grew, where the findings are and what a case looks like.

DOL's own yearly counts, by the fiscal year (October to September) a case concluded. A concluded case is any compliance action DOL closed, with or without a violation. Minors are those employed in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act's child labor rules, and penalties the civil money penalties assessed for those violations.

The share is 2.6 times what it was

From fiscal 2016 to fiscal 2025, the share of concluded cases with child labor violations went from 2.2% to 5.8%. The number of cases with child labor violations rose from 633 to 976 while the number of concluded cases fell from 28,589 to 16,924.

Share of concluded cases with child labor violations

Penalties grew faster

Civil penalties assessed for child labor violations went from $1.9 million in fiscal 2016 to $37.2 million in fiscal 2025, 20 times as much. The minors employed in violation rose from 1,756 to 5,272.

Child labor penalties assessed in concluded cases

Where the findings are

The industries, states and cases below come from the case records: the cases in DOL's enforcement database with a violation under the laws we track, counted once in the year their findings end, 2016 to 2025. Restaurants and food service hold 61% of the child labor findings in these 10 years (4,640 of 7,620). The industries differ widely in how often one of their cases carries a finding: 36% of amusement and recreation cases and 3% of building and business support services cases.

Cases with a child labor finding, by industry, 2016 to 2025

Industries with at least 300 cases with a violation, by the three-digit NAICS group DOL records.

Which states

Among the states with at least 1,000 cases with a violation, these 8 have the highest share with a child labor finding. The shares describe the cases DOL found a violation in for each state, which follow where DOL investigates as well as where children work.

Share of cases with a child labor finding, by state, 2016 to 2025

What a case looks like

Of the cases whose findings ended in 2023, the year with the most child labor findings, half of those with a finding carried $6,414 or less in penalties, and one in ten carried $76,236 or more. Across the 10 years of case records, a case with a finding named 4.4 minors on average, 33,744 in all, with $92.7 million in penalties.

Sources and method

The yearly trend is DOL's own count, read on October 20, 2026 from its Child Labor and All Acts tables. DOL counts a case in the fiscal year it concluded the case, and a share there is the cases with child labor violations over all concluded cases. The industries, states and cases come from the Wage and Hour Division enforcement database, loaded July 14, 2026. It carries no conclusion date, and our copy keeps the cases with a violation under the laws we track: 97,763 cases whose findings ended from 2016 to 2025. A case counts once, in the year its findings end, which can fall before the fiscal year DOL concluded it, and has a child labor finding when it carries a violation under the Fair Labor Standards Act's child labor rules. Minors are the minors named on those violations and penalties the civil money penalties assessed for them. An industry is a three-digit NAICS group as DOL records it, listed when it has at least 300 cases; a state is listed when it has at least 1,000. The busiest year is the year with the most child labor findings. Shares are rounded to one decimal in the yearly trend and to whole numbers elsewhere, and penalties to $0.1 million. Built by scripts/build_insights.py.

Corrected October 20, 2026. The first version of this article called the cases in the enforcement database "concluded cases" and gave their share with a child labor finding, 15% for 2023 (1,131 of 7,496), as a share of all concluded cases. The database holds the cases with a violation under the laws we track, so 15% is the share of those cases. Of the 20,215 cases DOL concluded in fiscal 2023, 955 (4.7%) had child labor violations. The yearly trend is now DOL's own count.

Sources: DOL Wage and Hour Division, child labor enforcement statistics; DOL Wage and Hour Division, enforcement statistics for all acts; DOL Open Data Portal, Wage and Hour Division enforcement data; DOL Wage and Hour Division, child labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Informational only; not legal, immigration, or financial advice.

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