Increase in the Number of Child Workers in Turkey in 1990s

Industrialization and economic development in big cities and decrease in labor in urban areas led urban people to migrate to cities such as Istanbul, Izmir and Ankara. After a while, increase in the migrated population started to bring some problems. One of these problems was increase in the number of child workers. Although the socio-economic policies, which are being applied by the government in 2000s, decreased the number of child workers by 58 percent according to Turkish Statistical Institute, increase in the number of child workers has been one of the most important problems in Turkey in 1990s. There are two main reasons for the increase in the number of child workers in Turkey in 1990s.

One of the reasons of the increase in the number of child workers in Turkey in 1990s is education-related problems. These problems were systematical and parent-related problems. Systematical or educational system problems, especially, were in the areas where migrated people lived such as Southeastern and Eastern Anatolian Regions. Education has been a problem because of the insufficient amount of budget allocated to education by the governments. The budget allocated to education in 1990s was approximately 5 percent. The budget in 2000s was about 9.5 percent. In addition to this, there were insufficient amount of schools and the other educational materials in the two regions. Besides of systematical problems, parent-related problems have been the other reason of education-related problems. These were parents' ignorance of the importance of education. Most of the parents of child workers are illiterate people or they were not able to get education because of the systematical problems.

After decrease in labor in urban areas led urban people to migrate to big cities, there has been decrease in the number of available jobs in the big cities. This caused some socio-economic problems. Decrease in qualified jobs with full salary by the increasing number of educated people led migrated people to find low-paid jobs. Because of economic crises and increase in inflation, people who were working at low-paid jobs were not able to afford the basic needs of their families. These eventually led people to the poverty. There are lots of reasons of the poverty. One of the most important reasons is unemployment. Although people thought that education would solve the unemployment problem in the late 1990s, there have been more unemployed people because of decrease in the demand of some jobs. Increase in the unemployment rate and decrease in the number of the workers in the family led parents to take advantage of the labor of their children. The children were able to, have to, work at some places where their parents were not allowed to work because of their health problems. Although the number of child workers has decreased in 2000s, the unemployment rate has continued to rise. Besides of these, irregularities in the distribution of wealth have been another