I'm quite astonished to see people promoting intense child labour. No government in the world completely prohibits light child labour (in the household/farm, and from usually around 14 also light work outside as long as it doesn't affect school hours). Anything beyond this can and will affect them negatively as established by pretty much all research out there. You seem to have luckily made it through that, but many kids never recover from intense childhood labour.

> All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, > All play and no work makes Jack a mere toy.

That's not quite true. The EU, US, UK, Japan all have legal minimum ages for employment ranging from 13-15.

I don't think the laws have changed that much from when I was young.

There's more focus on remaining in education sure (which is generally a good idea but often poorly implemented) but I think there's wider societal explanations as to why you see far fewer kids working outside school hours than you once did.