Columbia, SC — Hallelujah, South Carolina taxpayers are flush with money. Take-home pay is on the increase, so the rise in SCE&G utility bills is no hardship. Revenues have increased so rapidly this year that the state can easily pay for quality education, replacing decaying infrastructure, environmental inspections to ensure safe food and water, credit protection for every taxpayer for at least one year, hospital care for the poor, the establishment of clinics for some of the less fortunate and a tax credit for small businesses to help them pay the fine they will owe the federal government for not providing employee health insurance.

Instead of taking the federal money for Medicaid, we can use S.C. money (in the form of federal income taxes we pay) to help states such as Ohio and Michigan. South Carolinians should be proud. Such an action proves that we are a generous and compassionate people.

But don’t look around the corner at the number of job losses in South Carolina because of the sequester. Tax revenues might decrease, and that might reduce our abundance of money and goodwill.

Kathy Handel

Columbia