Verdingkinder, "contract children", or "indentured child laborers" were children in Switzerland who were taken from their parents, often due to poverty or moral reasons (e.g. the mother being unmarried, very poor, of Yenish origin, etc.), and sent to live with new families, often poor farmers who needed cheap labour. Many of these children, now adults, have now come forward to say that they were severely mistreated by their new families, suffering neglect, beatings and other physical and psychological abuse. The Verdingkinder scheme was common in Switzerland until the 1960s.