A new national report finds nearly half of all South Carolinians are struggling to pay their bills as they prepare to head to the ballot box this November. Simply put, people are stressing out over affordability, even though some candidates seem to be ignoring it.
The report, published May 27 by the Washington, D.C.-based Brookings Institution, used price and income data to track the affordability of a basic basket of goods, including housing, health care and groceries, at the state and county levels from 2014 to2024.
Here in South Carolina, the study reports 45% of households don’t earn enough to make ends meet, placing the state almost dead center in the national pack.
But the study’s authors note that, in many cases, the statewide averages conceal large disparities across geography and race — a phenomenon that’s strongly reflected in Palmetto State data.
For instance, while only 45% of Darlington County households are able to cover the costs of necessities, 68% of Jasper County are able to get by on their current after-tax income. And while only 47% of Black South Carolina households can afford the study’s basic basket of goods, about 61% of White households can.
According to the study, those racial disparities are driven primarily by income, not the inflation that affects affordability more broadly.
“As of the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics median earnings data, Black and Latino or Hispanic workers made 78 cents for every dollar made by a white worker,” the authors report. “The persistence of relatively lower incomes for certain groups means the threshold for the cost of living is less forgiving for those groups.”
The study’s findings broadly dovetail with the latest statewide poll from Winthrop University, which in late May found a large majority of South Carolinians saying that basic goods were increasingly out of their reach.
Given those concerns, Winthrop political science professor and poll director Scott Huffmon noted state leaders’ recent focus on national political concerns, such as last month’s failed attempt to redraw the state’s congressional lines, might seem tone-deaf to state voters.
“When nearly seven in 10 find groceries difficult to afford and almost 60% struggle with both health care and housing costs, South Carolina residents may wonder at the herculean efforts to address national political issues while many in the state feel pushed to the economic brink,” Huffmon said in a May 27 statement.
University of South Carolina economist Joseph Von Nessen said voters’ affordability concerns are borne out by the numbers, with broad, systemic inflation and, in some sectors, tariffs driving up the cost of living.
“When you compare purchasing power for the average South Carolinian today to where it was on the eve of the pandemic, most consumers have actually fallen behind because prices have risen faster than wages,” Von Nessen said Tuesday. “And while consumers are slowly clawing back that purchasing power, their dollar still doesn’t go as far as it did in 2020.”
Looking forward, Von Nessen said, economists are carefully watching a recent uptick in inflation, driven primarily by Iran War-related energy costs, that threatens to further erode affordability and consumer confidence heading into the second half of the year.
“Anytime the consumer buys anything — gas at the pump, groceries at the store, things on Amazon — all those goods need to be shipped, which requires energy,” he said. “So when energy prices rise, that affects prices across the economy and across all industries.”
That said, Von Nessen noted, the “potential silver lining” regarding war-related energy inflation is that it can fall as quickly as it rises.
“Oil prices were about $70 per barrel at the beginning of the year, then they peaked at around $120 per barrel, and now they’re back down to about $85 per barrel,” he said. “So we’ve seen significant fluctuation — and that’s really the wild card looking ahead.”
- For more on the Brookings affordability report, including breakdowns for all 46 S.C. counties, visit brookings.edu.
Jack O’Toole is Statehouse bureau chief for Statehouse Report and the Charleston City Paper. Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com
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