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A decade without leadership has put South Carolina's prosperity in peril.
For almost 10 years, our state has suffered through ineffective state leadership, aggravated by an unwieldy, antiquated government structure. The result has been a lost decade for our beloved state.
Our jobless rate has soared. For years during the 1990s, South Carolina enjoyed low unemployment rates; now, we have one of the highest in the nation.
Our public college tuition costs have skyrocketed. Over the past decade, we've seen college tuition more than double statewide and nearly triple at some colleges and universities.
Our government has become unresponsive. More than 40 states have raised their cigarette taxes to help fund health care and curtail youth smoking; our cigarette tax continues to be the lowest in the nation, unchanged even though three in four South Carolinians favor an increase.
Our momentum for change has been squandered. In the 1990s our state was on the cutting edge of government reform; but for the past 10 years, we have seen little progress in modernizing our government structure.
Worst of all, our expectations have flat-lined. Dangerously low expectations of our government are perhaps the worst symptom of this lost decade. Some South Carolinians think this is the way it always has been and always will be.
But it doesn't have to be this way.
For the entire column, visit The State online.
