Lost in Transition: The Regulation of Unpaid Labour during the School-to-Labour Market Transition in Ontario

Abstract

The main goal of this paper is provide a baseline analysis of the regulatory protections  that  youths  receive,  or  don’t  receive,  during  the  school-to-labour market transition. This paper is divided into two sections. The first section  overviews  the  current  regulatory  environment  in  Ontario pertaining  to  the  unpaid  labour  that  youths  undertake  as  part  of  the school-to-labour market transition. This section examines the exclusions, under  statutes  and  policy, which  deny  youths  critical  protections  under employment  standards,  occupational  health  and  safety,  workers’ compensation, and human rights laws. The second section analyzes the current  regulatory  environment  and  argues  that  Ontario’s  regulatory approach is largely little more than a series of statutory exclusions which deny  youths  key  protections  during  the  school-to-labour  market transition,  which  is  arguably  the  most  critical  phase  in  any  person’s working life.

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