MOULTRIE — Colquitt County High School students say the economy is their primary concern over other issues facing voters this election year.

A small group of Colquitt County High School students were asked to give their opinions on what was important to them and what they would like to see addressed by candidates.

A majority of the class will turn 18 by the time the presidential election happens in November, and one student had already registered to vote.

When asked if they were going to vote in this year’s election, there were a couple of students who said, “yes, definitely,” and one student who said he was in the middle about whether he wanted to vote or not.

When asked what issues facing voters they were personally concerned about, the economy was the prevalent theme.

Will Madison, 17, said he was concerned with pay rate and that it shouldn’t matter where a person was employed.

“Just making sure that everyone has an equal pay rate,” he said.

LyQuavian Wheeler, 17, said, “With the cost of living nowadays, most people getting straight out of high school, if they go to try to get an apartment, their own place to stay, minimum wage is nowhere near enough for you to get your own place to stay. It’s nowhere near enough.”

Madison nodded his head in agreement and Wheeler added that even with government assisted homes that are available, the pay is not enough for someone just coming out of high school to afford.

“So, I really think the cost of living in America, in general, is like … is like overrun,” he said.

When asked if he thought a candidate could fix that, Wheeler said he thought that it could be “put in place” but America was in a really, really bad inflation period at the moment and Madison also agreed.

“Inflation is like really, really bad. I think the economy itself isn’t the best. So, that’s why the cost of living is so high,” Wheeler said. “But then again, there is a way that they can reduce inflation. They can have a recession so it’s not so high. So, there’s no excuse for it being so high. We can literally change it.”

Dariana Ventura, 18, said, “Many families are low-income families. They are having trouble paying for food.”

Wheeler brought up his concern about coming out of college with a “career” job that would, at one time, have had an individual living a “high class life” and, now, he didn’t see that as being true.

“Those, now, are … like barely scraping by. Those high-end jobs,” he said.

He gave as an example that, in 2016, an accountant was considered a “high-class job” but now it’s just “barely scraping by.”

“Not to mention the student loans you’ve accumulated,” added Aaron Fields, 17, and the other students agreed.

“I would like a candidate who can really socialize with other countries and keep us out of war. and definitely one that can spend less money on other countries’ wars,” said Fields.

He also added that he would like a candidate who could save more money because, as he understood, the United States was close to $30 trillion in debt as a nation. (The actual figure is $34.57 trillion, according to a U.S. Treasury Department website.)

“National debt,” Ventura clarified and continued, “National debt is really affecting us right now.”

The other students in the group nodded their heads in agreement at this statement.

“Which is why taxes are going up,” she added.

Wheeler brought up gun violence and said that he was concerned about it but not necessarily here in this community. He said he was concerned about it when he went other places.

“I wouldn’t say get rid of them completely but I’d definitely say that around the places where crime rate is higher than average in America, there should be way more…,” he said with Madison interjecting, “more security.”

Wheeler said that there should be more enforcement in those high-crime areas about having guns illegally.

“You shouldn’t have guns illegally. That’s where most of the gun violence comes from,” he said.

Fields brought up border security and said, “I think that border security should be more of a priority because I feel like it’s a lot easier for, not only gang members, but people just to be able to bring guns into our country.”

He went on to say, “Even if you implement inside of our country, the laws and restrictions on buying guns, how much is it truly gonna do if you’re able to just bring them across the border.”

He also circled around back to the students’ concerns about inflation and said, “I also think that has a lot to also do with inflation because bringing all these new people into our country. Inflation is caused by high prices because people are buying and buying and buying. If you have more people, you have more buying, which is gonna cause higher inflation.”

Venture said that she agreed because it seemed like the immigrants were coming into the country getting a lot of things free like healthcare and sometimes American citizens weren’t being taken care of.

The students were asked for their thoughts on the wars in the Ukraine and in Israel and Ventura immediately said, “I don’t think we should get involved with it.”

“I agree,” said Madison.

She went on to say, “We’re just making things worse by interfering with them. That puts threats on us and our country.”

The students were asked what political party seemed to best represent what they believed about current voter issues. Then, the students were polled, by a show of hands, as to what party they leaned more toward. They were given the choices of Republican, Democrat, Independent or No party. The Democrat Party and No party each received three votes, the Republican Party received one vote and the Independent received no votes.

“I don’t focus on the party. I just focus on the individual because there are some Republicans that make worse decisions than Democrats,” Ventura said and went on to say that she looked for a candidate that was the best for the country.

As far as knowing about the candidates that are running in the presidential election this year, the students seemed to agree that they knew more about Donald Trump than the others because he popped up on social media platforms like TikTok.

Madison said that he needed to do more research before deciding on a candidate.

The final question asked was: Who would you vote for if Joe Biden and Donald Trump were the final two candidates on the ballot in November? Donald Trump received three votes, Joe Biden received one vote and there were three abstentions.

“I just want to see who becomes president,” said Wheeler.

“And I want to see if whoever becomes president makes the economy better,” said Madison.