11 March 2023
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Senator Roger Marshall wants more people to get back to work. He said too many people are living off of federal dollars and are not inclined to rejoin the workforce.
“If we’re paying $60,000 to 80,000 a year of federal and state aid, why would you go start a job for $25 an hour?” he said. “This is why I’m pushing at the federal level to end all the COVID emergencies. We can’t keep paying people’s rent, paying their utility bill, paying their tuition payment, food stamps, unemployment, all those things when we have all these jobs out here.”
Marshall was in Wichita Friday to meet with Sedgwick County commissioners about infrastructure issues. He also planned to meet with the South Central Kansas Workforce Alliance.
“The word for today is jobs,” he said. “That’s the reason I’m in Wichita today, is what can we do to connect people to the jobs that we have? … Everywhere I go across the state of Kansas, people have job openings but not people for the jobs that we do have.”
Marshall said that seven million men, ages 25-45, across America are not working.
“In Kansas, that probably translates to 25 or 30 thousand able-bodied men between the ages of 25 and 45 that are not working,” he said.
Integra Technologies is one of the places he planned to visit on his trip. Integra is trying to get federal funding to expand and create as many as 2,500 new jobs.
“I’m going to do everything we can to help Integra get launched down in the Bel Aire area,” Marshall said. “I’m all for it. Integra is a company that we identified several years ago. They do an incredible job already with the special high-tech chips.”
He said he has a high school classmate who has worked for Integra for 20 years.
“So this is a company I’ve been following for years. I know that they can do it, so I have so much confidence in them. We’ll put all of our strength and power into working with the state of Kansas, working with Sen. Moran, to try to get that opportunity off the ground.”
Marshall said people should want to work.
“I think a job is a great thing. I think a job brings dignity to a family. It brings self-worth. I think it’s part of the solution to the mental health epidemic we’re seeing out here as well.”
He said the county commissioners also wanted to talk with him about Amtrak.
“You know, trying to get a public transportation project through Newton, through Wichita, on down to Oklahoma City. The Heartland Flyer is what they’re calling it, the Heartland Flyer Amtrak extension.”
“I think it’s feasible now,” Marshall said. “For the last, my six years doing the job in the House and now the Senate, we’ve been much more focused on trying to get Amtrak in a good situation, going from Newton on down through southwest Kansas, New Mexico, down to there. So, I think we’ve got a lot of that work done now, and we’ll see if there’s some opportunity to now start putting a little more focus on the Heartland Flyer. So, I hope so. I’m not going to over-promise.”
Marshall was asked to comment on President Joe Biden’s budget.
“First of all, President Biden’s budget is dead on arrival,” he said. “He’s more taxes, more regulations. That’s the theme of this. He wants to increase corporation taxes from 21 to 28%. Those taxes are just going to be passed on to consumers, driving up inflation even more. So we’re working on our own budget, and what we’re going to do is use the debt ceiling as leverage to try to bring Joe Biden back to earth and try to come up with a balanced budget of some sort.”