Read the passage.

Miss Rife of the Federated Charities, told me it is a general rule, at these canneries, to have the children get their jobs first and then have them apply for permits. . . . A working woman told Miss Rife that one cannery requires no permits and that there are lots of children there.
There are several dangers connected with this work when children do it. On every hand, one can see little tots toting boxes or pans full of beans, berries or tomatoes, and it is self-evident that the work is too hard. Then there are machines which no young person should be working around. Unguarded belts, wheels, cogs and the like are a menace to careless children.

–"Child Labor in the Canning Industry of Maryland,”
Lewis W. Hine,
1909

The use of child labor in industrial applications is best described as a consequence of

A) a class-action lawsuit by a group of minors petitioning for the right to work.
B) a desire in the new South to establish a slavery-like system for industry.
C) the need for less-skilled labor resulting from mass production.
D) the social stigma of a child who did not work as a drain on family resources.