Maryland Child Labor Laws: Ages, Hours, and Permits

Maryland child labor laws prohibit employing anyone under 14, require a work permit for every worker under 18, and set age-specific limits on hours, night work, and the types of jobs a minor can hold. The rules sit in Title 3, Subtitle 2 of the Labor and Employment Article and work alongside the federal Fair Labor Standards Act. When both apply, the standard that better protects the minor controls.¹

Minimum Age and What Doesn’t Count as a Job

A child under 14 cannot be employed in Maryland.² The statute carves out a short list of activities that fall outside the child labor subtitle entirely, so long as they happen outside school hours and away from manufacturing, mining, or hazardous work:³

Work in a business owned or run by a parent or someone acting as a parent.
Delivering newspapers directly to consumers.
Farm labor on a farm, and household chores in or around a home.
Caddying on a golf course.
Serving as a counselor or instructor at a certified Maryland youth camp.
Unpaid volunteer work for a charitable or nonprofit organization with a parent’s written consent. Hazardous volunteer work with a fire department or rescue squad requires the minor to be at least 16 and enrolled in or having completed a related training course.

Federal FLSA requirements still apply separately to these activities, so a family running a farm or business should check both sets of rules. Children under 14 can also receive a special permit to work as a model, performer, or entertainer, but only through the Commissioner’s Office rather than the regular permit system.⁴

The Work Permit Requirement

Every minor under 18 needs a work permit before starting a job in Maryland.⁴ The minor applies online after receiving a job offer, prints the form, and then the minor, a parent or guardian, and the employer each sign it. A permit is not issued without an offer already in hand, and changing jobs means getting a new one. Employers must keep the signed permit on file for three years.²

Hour Limits by Age

Regardless of age, any minor working five consecutive hours must be given a 30-minute break.⁵ Federal law does not require breaks for minors, so this state rule is the one to follow.

Ages 14 and 15

Maryland’s statute lets minors under 16 work up to 4 hours on a school day and 23 hours in a school week.⁶ Federal law is tighter for 14- and 15-year-olds, and the tighter rule controls. The effective limits are:¹

3 hours on a school day.
8 hours on a non-school day.
18 hours in a school week.
40 hours in a non-school week.

They cannot work before 7:00 a.m. or after 7:00 p.m. during the school year. From June 1 through Labor Day, the evening cutoff extends to 9:00 p.m.

Ages 16 and 17

Federal law does not cap weekly hours for this age group, so Maryland’s rules fill the gap. Combined school and work hours in a calendar day cannot exceed 12, and the minor must have at least 8 consecutive hours free from both school and work in every 24-hour period.⁵ The U.S. Department of Labor’s state standards table shows the effective limits as 4 hours on a school day, 23 combined school-and-work hours per school week, 8 hours on a non-school day, and 40 hours in a non-school week.⁷

Night work is restricted too. These minors generally cannot work between 8:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. during the school year, with the evening cutoff moving to 9:00 p.m. from Memorial Day through Labor Day.

Jobs Minors Cannot Do

Some occupations are off-limits to any minor under 18. These include manufacturing or handling hazardous substances, blast furnace work, distillery jobs producing or bottling alcohol, railroad work, serving as an engineer, firefighter, or pilot on a commercial vessel, dock or wharf work outside marinas serving pleasure boats, electrical wiring, and cleaning, oiling, or wiping machinery.⁸

Minors under 16 face additional restrictions. They cannot work in or around airports, brickyards, lumberyards, scaffolding, or facilities where goods are manufactured or processed. Construction, jobs producing harmful dust, and the operation of power-driven machinery are also barred, with narrow exceptions for office equipment and machines used in school vocational programs.

Maryland’s Commissioner of Labor can also adopt federal Hazardous Occupations Orders by reference, so the 17 federal orders covering work like roofing and power-driven woodworking apply here as well. Limited exceptions exist for supervised work-study, student-learner, and apprenticeship placements, which require Commissioner approval.⁴

Pay for Minor Employees

Maryland does not exempt minors from minimum wage, but it does allow a reduced rate. Workers under 18 must earn at least 85% of the state minimum wage.⁹ With the statewide minimum at $15.00 per hour, that puts the floor at $12.75. Some counties set higher local minimums that can raise this floor further.

Federal law allows a $4.25 youth wage for workers under 20 during their first 90 consecutive calendar days on the job, but Maryland’s 85% rate is far higher and controls in practice.¹⁰ Every minor working in Maryland earns at least $12.75 per hour from day one.

What Employers Must Do

Before a minor starts, the employer signs the work permit and keeps it on file for three years.² A summary of Maryland’s child labor laws must be displayed in a visible location at the workplace.¹¹ Every shift has to fit the daily cap, weekly cap, night curfew, and the 30-minute break rule. When a minor moves to a new position or a new employer, a fresh permit is required.

Scheduling is where most employers slip. A manager who isn’t tracking the school calendar can easily push a 15-year-old past the daily or weekly cap without noticing. Building the age-based limits into scheduling software prevents most of these problems.

Penalties for Violations

Maryland treats child labor violations as misdemeanors on two tiers. A general violation carries a fine of up to $1,000, up to 90 days in jail, or both. Violations under the heightened penalty subsection carry fines up to $10,000, imprisonment up to one year, or both.¹²

Federal penalties run separately and tend to be steeper. A civil penalty under the FLSA can reach $16,035 per affected minor. If a violation causes death or serious injury to a worker under 18, the penalty rises to $72,876 per violation, and that amount can double for repeated or willful conduct.¹³ The same conduct can trigger both state and federal exposure.

How State and Federal Rules Fit Together

Maryland employers are generally subject to both state child labor law and the federal FLSA. When both cover the same situation, the higher standard for the minor applies, and complying with one law does not excuse a violation of the other.¹

The clearest example is hours for 14- and 15-year-olds: Maryland allows 4 hours on a school day and 23 in a school week, but federal caps of 3 and 18 are lower and control. The 30-minute break after five consecutive hours runs the other direction, since federal law requires no break at all and the state rule governs. Maryland’s Minor Fact Sheet already reflects these combined effective limits and is a reliable starting point for scheduling.²

1
U.S. Department of Labor. Fact Sheet #43: Child Labor Provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) for Nonagricultural Occupations
2
Maryland Department of Labor. Minor Fact Sheet
3
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Labor and Employment 3-203 – Scope of Subtitle
4
Maryland Department of Labor. Employment of Minors (Work Permit) – Employment Standards Service
5
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Labor and Employment 3-210 – Work Hours in General
6
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Labor and Employment 3-211 – Work Hours Minors Under 16
7
U.S. Department of Labor. Selected State Child Labor Standards Affecting Minors Under 18 in Non-farm Employment
8
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Labor and Employment 3-213 – Prohibited Employment
9
Maryland Department of Labor. Maryland Minimum Wage and Overtime Law – Employment Standards
10
U.S. Department of Labor. Fact Sheet #32: Youth Minimum Wage – Fair Labor Standards Act
11
Maryland Department of Labor. Employment Related Posters and Notices
12
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Labor and Employment 3-216 – Prohibited Acts and Penalties
13
eCFR. 29 CFR Part 579 – Child Labor Violations Civil Money Penalties