On the recordFebruary 26, 2014
Madam Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mining, construction work, manufacturing, those are the kinds of livelihoods that have made this country a great nation, people being able to go to work with a lunchbox in hand and work hard every day, make a decent wage. By the way, $7.25 an hour for a full-time worker would equate to about $14,500 a year. That is just simply not enough for a working person to raise a family and take care of that family. They need help when they make $7.25 an hour. They would need help from the government if they couldn't rely on friends and relatives for support. So that is a shame, in this day and time, where a person working a manufacturing job, or even a job in a mine or on a construction site, would be making $7.25 an hour. We should, perhaps, Madam Chair, be paying attention to income generators such as that kind of legislation, as opposed to legislation like H.R. 2804, which would simply make it difficult to protect those workers in those unsafe occupations like mining, like construction work, like manufacturing, keeping the work site, the job place safe. Regulations are what do that. With that, Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.





