Your first job in Louisiana: the employment certificate, school-night hours, and pay

If you are 14 to 17, you almost certainly need the certificate (the main exceptions are federally funded youth training programs and acting, modeling, or music work). Start with the Youth Employment Certificate form from laworks.net. The employer fills in the job, the hours per day and week, and the pay. A parent or legal guardian signs it. Then you take it, with proof of age, to your school principal or your parish school board office, and you apply in person.

Proof of age can be a birth certificate, a passport, a school record or school ID, or a Louisiana driver's license or state ID. The school enters your information online and prints the certificate. You and the school official both sign it, and you hand the original to your employer.

One detail surprises people. A certificate is valid only for the employer it was issued for. If you switch from the snowball stand to a grocery store, you need a new one.

Under 16, Louisiana allows at most 3 hours on a school day and 18 hours in a school week. You cannot work before 7 a.m. or after 7 p.m., except from June 1 through Labor Day, when the limit moves to 9 p.m. The daily cap is 8 hours, the weekly cap is 40, and you cannot work more than six days in a row. You also get a 30-minute meal break for every five hours worked. These match the federal rule for 14 and 15 year olds in 29 CFR 570.35 on the key numbers.

At 16 and 17, the difference shows up. The federal hours rule is written only for 14 and 15 year olds. Louisiana adds a school-night limit: if you have not graduated, a 16-year-old cannot work between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. before a school day, and a 17-year-old cannot work between midnight and 5 a.m. before a school day. Passing the GED counts as graduating for this rule.

The Workforce Commission's labor law page sends minimum wage questions to the U.S. Department of Labor, so the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour is the number to know. Federal law also allows a 'youth opportunity wage' of $4.25 an hour for workers under 20, but only during their first 90 days with that employer.

Congress has not always been allowed to set child labor rules. In Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918), a father sued on behalf of his two sons who worked in a cotton mill in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Congress's 1916 law against selling goods made by child workers across state lines. Today's federal floor came later, and Louisiana's rules sit on top of it.