Wednesday, May 18, 2011

South Carolina House says Yes to 2000 jobs proposed by Amazon.com

- - - Doing right is even harder than it looks.----
5/18/2011

The South Carolina House  votes 97-20 to permit Amazon.com a five year sales tax exemption.
This vote was a huge turn around from the 71-47 rejection of the agreement with the company earlier in April.   Under the new bill, Amazon will build a 125 million dollars worth of  facilities and employ 2000 full time workers in the Palmetto State by 2013. The bill which  formalizes the deal, exempts Amazon.com from collecting sales tax for the state until 2016.

The Governor  said she will neither sign nor veto the bill if the senate approves the agreement
passed by the House.

Under South Carolina's constitution the Bill becomes  law in 5 days after being brought to
the Governor's desk. In order to be brought to the Governor's desk, the bill will now need to pass the South Carolina senate.  Senate passage seems  likely, since the house passed the bill with a 5 to 1 majority.  The huge majority is attributed to the efforts of  Representatives Bingham and
Denny Neilson.

Wal-Mart says it will regroup and try to convince the South Carolina senate to reject the deal.
Wal-Mart faces a hard sell.  It is doubtful that the senate will reject  Amazon.com's 2000 jobs.   More so now that awareness of  Wal-Mart's astro turf campaign has come to light.  South Carolinians realized that the 'Mains Street' organization which championed rejection of Amazon.com's agreement consisted almost entirely of Wal-Mart's and Best Buy's hired supporters.

Wal-Mart allied with Best Buy  had hoped to prevent competition for their  best employees due to the fact that  Amazon.com pays significantly higher wages - about 30 percent higher on average.

The Amazon.com jobs would include a health care plan and average  $32,000 dollars per year. That average pay is about $8,000 dollars higher than what Wal-Mart currently pays its full time employees in South Carolina.

It is hoped that several other businesses will locate in South Carolina now that Amazon.com and Boeing have chosen to join BMW installations in the Palmetto State.

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