Chip Taylor

SC business leaders urge change in economic development strategy

From the Greenville News:

South Carolina must revamp its economic strategy and raise its standard of living or it will be left behind by other states adapting to the rapidly emerging global economy, business, education and government leaders said Thursday.

Again and again at the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce's annual summit in Greenville, they delivered the same message, often bluntly, but always clearly: The state has abundant resources and the potential to create more wealth and prosperity, but the economic development approach of selling itself as a low-cost place to do business with cheap labor has run its course.

That "is not the formula for long-term success," said Lake City native Darla Moore. "But we've done it that way forever."

A key challenge, she said, is whether the state has the will to change that attitude.

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Despite efforts to create jobs that pay more for residents, per capita income in South Carolina has remained behind its Southeastern neighbors and fallen in the national rankings, said Dr. Graham Toft of the economic strategy firm Thomas P. Miller & Associates.

Thus, South Carolina has to improve faster to gain ground, he said. Per capita income for state residents is 82.5 percent of the national average, behind North Carolina's 88.8 percent and Georgia's 91.2 percent, Toft's figures showed.

And while residents continue to make more money, Toft said it's "a situation of running to stand still," because local prosperity isn't catching up with other states.

North Carolina was lumped among what he called "break-away states," which has distanced itself along with Virginia, Tennessee and others by chasing new industry and growing locally owned start-ups. These states are emphasizing better technology, improving basic standards of living, creatively making the work force better, and finding new ways to collaborate for better end results.

Most lacking in South Carolina, Toft said, is what he called "entrepreneurial dynamism," or the ability to more quickly improve and change the way people do business.

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