How would a utilitarian view child labor?

Answer 1

That would really depend. A TRUE utilitarian would consider all happiness and anguish created by child labor. Because some people obviously profit from it and thus receive utility
And only if he would find that child labor creates more anguish then happiness then they would condemn it.
The caveat is, that it is REALLY hard to calculate exact amount of utility produced by anything.

Answer 2

There are two options.

A utilitarian with little perspective would view child labor as useful to the economy and essential for meeting the needs of the people.

A utilitarian with a greater perspective would view child labor as a drag on the economy. With child labor, their would be no opportunity for education. Without educated people, the economy, government, etc. cannot hope to "keep up" with its demands, let alone advance.

Answer 3

That would depend upon that utilitarian's time horizon and whether or not that utilitarian was a rules utilitarian.

A utilitarian with any type of long term time horizon would see that child labor, in that it denies it participants the ability to receive an education which leads to greater levels of productivity, does not promote the greater good.

Most rules utilitarians would also recognize that child labor is not a good societal institution.

Answer 4

He would TRY to compare the obvious suffering and missed opportunities to the child (i.e. school and play-time) against the wage the child got and the immediate necessity it provided for.

for example if there is no school the child may attend and the choice is starvation or working , the utilitaruian would say the benefits were greater than the costs. problem is we rarely get such black and white options in life.

Answer 5

Their just too slow and weak, you can hardly get 12 hours of work before they want to be fed and stuff. The ware out really quick too, the replacement cost is huge.

Answer 6

passively looking at how that child will bring profit to the state.