OPINION AND COMMENTARY
Editorials and other Opinion content offer perspectives on issues important to our community and are independent from the work of our newsroom reporters.
Lawmakers have an important decision ahead of them that will impact Kansans with disabilities for years to come. Our state elected officials can choose to treat people with disabilities equally in our workforce — or these leaders can double down on a 1938 policy relic of the Franklin Roosevelt administration that allows people with disabilities to be paid subminimum wage.
Can you imagine this being an acceptable practice — to pay someone less than minimum wage — because of their race? Or if someone were required to do a productivity test to be paid minimum wage simply because they had a certain color of skin?
What if all adults over the age of 65 had to prove they deserved to earn minimum wage at their job, but individuals under 65 did not?
All of these scenarios are discriminatory.
Even worse, the bill currently under consideration in Topeka, H.B. 2275, would expand a tax credit to entities that pay people with disabilities less than minimum wage (also known as holding a 14(c) subminimum wage certificate from the U.S. Department of Labor). The current Kansas disability tax credit law, which was enacted in 2019, does not allow entities paying less than minimum wage to access these tax credits.
As lawmakers weigh this decision, the rest of our nation is moving ahead. Several states have already taken...
Patricia White, 70, of Old Greenwich, received a nine-month prison sentence for submitting false claims for unclaimed properties to around 30 state treasuries. HARRISBURG, Pa. — Months after her br...