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Macaulay Culkin, Drew Barrymore, the Olsen twins – these are just a few of the myriad of child actors who have starred in iconic films and shows. The most successful actors have gained international fame and millions of dollars through television shows, movie deals, and advertising contracts. Their legal rights are well-established and upheld, but this wasn’t always the case – child actors in the early 1900s paved the way for actors now. Jackie Coogan, regarded as one of the first child actors, starred in some of the highest-grossing films of the 1920s but didn’t see a dime of his earnings by the time he was 20 years old. After Coogan sued his parents for spending nearly all of his money, California and other states passed the Coogan Law. These state laws require that employers deposit 15% of a minor’s wages into a blocked trust account. Federal law offers little protection for child actors because they are exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Today, social media poses a new threat to children that has yet to be fully addressed by the law. There are a myriad of “family influencers” on TikTok, posting daily videos of their children to their millions of followers. Some accounts feature children in their teens, while others post videos of their newborn babies coming home from the hospital. While the content may seem light-hearted and fun, these videos can have serious consequences on the privacy and safety of these children. First, the children in these videos don’t fully understand the permanency of social media. Now more than ever your digital footprint can affect your future educational and career opportunities, and it’s not fair for their parents to put so much of their children’s life on social media when they can’t fully consent. Moreover, the line between work and play is no longer clear – should these children be paid for filming an ad with their parents? Should the children be paid when the parents receive revenue from a video of them playing outside?

 Some laws have been passed to address other issues with children and social media use, including age verification requirements for accounts and regulating pornographic media exposure to children. Other laws attempting to regulate children’s social media use have been met with lawsuits from tech industry groups including Meta and TikTok, arguing that these regulations “likely violate” the First Amendment. However, few laws have been introduced that address the specific issue of children being compensated for the income their parents receive from their videos.

Congress and state legislatures should create more robust protections for children on social media, regarding their privacy and compensation for the advertisements they film. Specifically, states should expand the Coogan Law to include children on social media. This would compel parents to set aside a portion of the revenue they receive from their content, just like parents of child actors must do. It is more difficult to figure out precisely where to draw the line when both parents and children are in the content, however more exact rules could be outlined later in the law. While this solution doesn’t address children’s privacy concerns, it is a good start to ensure they are fairly compensated.

The first step in addressing children’s rights must be to change the thinking around children on social media; it may be difficult for people to analogize children in TikTok videos to child actors. It can also be difficult to strike a balance between giving parents the autonomy to decide for themselves what’s best for their child and protecting children from potential exploitation on social media. Above all, children deserve to be compensated for the income they help generate, no matter if it’s on a set or in their own home.

 

Suggested Citation: Hannah Young, From Actors to Social Media Influencers: Where do Children’s Rights Fit in?, Cornell J.L. & Pub. Pol’y, The Issue Spotter (November 27, 2023), http://jlpp.org/blogzine/from-actors-to-social-media-influenceers-where-do-childrens-rights-fit-in/.