South Carolina tops Georgia, North Carolina

In teenage pregnancy, that is.

Yes, in a national survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, South Carolina now ranks 11th in the nation in teenage pregnancy. While we're not the highest representative from the South -- Mississippi takes the top spot, thus diverting attention from us again -- we still beat our neighbors to the north and west resoundingly.

It's spelled out in today's edition of the New York Times.

Nearly every state saw a decline in teen births from 2007 to 2010, with the biggest drop in Arizona at 29 percent. Rates stayed about the same in three states: Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention previously reported that U.S. births by mothers of all ages had dropped in 2010 for the third straight year. Experts think the economy is a factor.

The rate for teenage moms reached its lowest point since record-keeping began in 1940. The rate fell 9 percent to about 34 per 1,000 girls ages 15 through 19. The decline was seen among all racial and ethnic groups.

The CDC report released Tuesday focused on state figures. The authors say the teen declines have been attributed to pregnancy prevention efforts. They note that a recent government survey showed more use of contraception by teens.

Even as it leads the nation with 55 teen births per 1,000 girls, Mississippi's rate has been falling like everywhere else. It dropped 21 percent over three years. New Hampshire has the lowest teen birth rate at just under 16.

Since 1991, the overall teen rate has dropped by 44 percent. Without that decline, the authors calculated, there would have been 3.4 million more babies born to girls by 2010.

State list with the rate per 1,000 teenage girls:

1. Mississippi 55

2. New Mexico 52.9

3. Arkansas 52.5

4. Texas 52.2

5. Oklahoma 50.4

6. Louisiana 47.7

7. Kentucky 46.2

8. West Virginia 44.8

9. Alabama 43.6

10. Tennessee 43.2

11. South Carolina 42.5

12. Arizona 42.4

13. Georgia 41.4

14. Kansas 39.2

15. Wyoming 39

16. Nevada 38.6

17. Alaska 38.3

17. North Carolina 38.3

19. Indiana 37.3

20. Missouri 37.1

As we learned yesterday in a study from Auburn University, teenage pregnancy is directly correlated with low educational attainment and poverty. So South Carolina has, depending on one's perspective, a lot of work to do, or a lot to be proud of, as our present budget priorities keep us locked in a trifecta of shame: Inadequate support for public education, inadequate attention to poverty and inadequate prevention of teenage pregnancy.

But our governor is selling books, so it's a great day in South Carolina.

Study: Affluence predicts educational opportunity, success

Here's new evidence that the far-right political agenda -- benefiting our wealthiest citizens and corporate interests at the expense of our poorest citizens, working families and their children -- is working perfectly.

The headline in today's New York Times tells the tale: "Education Gap Grows Between Rich and Poor, Studies Say."

And a graphic accompanying the text illustrates the point: "The achievement gap between rich and poor is double the gap between black and white children."

Education was historically considered a great equalizer in American society, capable of lifting less advantaged children and improving their chances for success as adults. But a body of recently published scholarship suggests that the achievement gap between rich and poor children is widening, a development that threatens to dilute education’s leveling effects.

It is a well-known fact that children from affluent families tend to do better in school. Yet the income divide has received far less attention from policy makers and government officials than gaps in student accomplishment by race.

Now, in analyses of long-term data published in recent months, researchers are finding that while the achievement gap between white and black students has narrowed significantly over the past few decades, the gap between rich and poor students has grown substantially during the same period.

“We have moved from a society in the 1950s and 1960s, in which race was more consequential than family income, to one today in which family income appears more determinative of educational success than race,” said Sean F. Reardon, a Stanford University sociologist. Professor Reardon is the author of a study that found that the gap in standardized test scores between affluent and low-income students had grown by about 40 percent since the 1960s, and is now double the testing gap between blacks and whites.

To educators -- those who spend their lives teaching children -- this is not news. It's easy to see the vast difference between children of affluence and children of poverty, in the same classroom.

Affluence equals educational opportunity outside the classroom. Poverty makes a child dependent wholly on the opportunities provided in public schools, and when those opportunities are starved for resources, the outcomes are obvious.

In another study, by researchers from the University of Michigan, the imbalance between rich and poor children in college completion — the single most important predictor of success in the work force — has grown by about 50 percent since the late 1980s.

The changes are tectonic, a result of social and economic processes unfolding over many decades. The data from most of these studies end in 2007 and 2008, before the recession’s full impact was felt. Researchers said that based on experiences during past recessions, the recent downturn was likely to have aggravated the trend.

“With income declines more severe in the lower brackets, there’s a good chance the recession may have widened the gap,” Professor Reardon said. In the study he led, researchers analyzed 12 sets of standardized test scores starting in 1960 and ending in 2007. He compared children from families in the 90th percentile of income — the equivalent of around $160,000 in 2008, when the study was conducted — and children from the 10th percentile, $17,500 in 2008. By the end of that period, the achievement gap by income had grown by 40 percent, he said, while the gap between white and black students, regardless of income, had shrunk substantially.

Both studies were first published last fall in a book of research, “Whither Opportunity?” compiled by the Russell Sage Foundation, a research center for social sciences, and the Spencer Foundation, which focuses on education. Their conclusions, while familiar to a small core of social sciences scholars, are now catching the attention of a broader audience, in part because income inequality has been a central theme this election season.

The connection between income inequality among parents and the social mobility of their children has been a focus of President Obama as well as some of the Republican presidential candidates.

Indeed. The Times article appears on the same day that presidential candidate Mitt Romney is trying desperately to persuade conservatives at a right-wing conference in Washington that he'll gut federal aid to programs like education, to prove he's one of them. Their shared goal, one may speculate, is to ensure that the children of the wealthy continue to thrive, while the children of the poor will be taught to be obedient workers.

One reason for the growing gap in achievement, researchers say, could be that wealthy parents invest more time and money than ever before in their children (in weekend sports, ballet, music lessons, math tutors, and in overall involvement in their children’s schools), while lower-income families, which are now more likely than ever to be headed by a single parent, are increasingly stretched for time and resources. This has been particularly true as more parents try to position their children for college, which has become ever more essential for success in today’s economy.

A study by Sabino Kornrich, a researcher at the Center for Advanced Studies at the Juan March Institute in Madrid, and Frank F. Furstenberg, scheduled to appear in the journal Demography this year, found that in 1972, Americans at the upper end of the income spectrum were spending five times as much per child as low-income families. By 2007 that gap had grown to nine to one; spending by upper-income families more than doubled, while spending by low-income families grew by 20 percent.

“The pattern of privileged families today is intensive cultivation,” said Dr. Furstenberg, a professor of sociology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Intensive cultivation.

Like hothouse flowers, the children of the wealthy are tended carefully, watched and stroked by their gardeners. Children in poverty must wait for national charities to send backpacks with "school supplies, non-perishable food, personal hygiene items like toothpaste and combs, and children's books."

Intensive cultivation.

Meredith Phillips, an associate professor of public policy and sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles, used survey data to show that affluent children spend 1,300 more hours than low-income children before age 6 in places other than their homes, their day care centers, or schools (anywhere from museums to shopping malls). By the time high-income children start school, they have spent about 400 hours more than poor children in literacy activities, she found.

Dr. Seuss wrote a little book called "Oh, The Places You'll Go"; our corporate minders re-titled it "Oh, The Place You'll Go If You're the Children of Wealth."

So let's do what we're told, kids. Back to work. Our owners have a quota to meet.

Child poverty characterizes South Carolina's image again

One day, when enough South Carolinians are sick and tired of hearing stories like this one, our lawmakers will take steps to correct the problem. Until then, South Carolina will continue to be known as the state that doesn't take care of its impoverished children, and the state where public school educators care as much for their students' well-being as for their standardized test scores.

This one comes to us from Huffington Post, where a woman who spends her time addressing the needs of children in Third World countries noticed that poor children in South Carolina bear a striking resemblance to poor children in those other places.

My work with Save the Children takes me all around the world. In just the past few months, I've traveled to Egypt, Uganda, Kenya and several places in between. Everywhere I go, I meet people who are doing remarkable work for children and hear about how individuals are giving their all to keep kids in their community safe, healthy and happy. But one of the stories that I find replaying over and over in my head is a story I heard right here in America's backyard, at St. Paul Elementary School in Clarendon County, South Carolina.

The determined and energetic principal there, Rosa Dingle, told me about a recent school day when one of her teachers called her down to her classroom and asked her to watch the class for half an hour. Rosa went, perplexed about why her teacher would suddenly need to leave the classroom to run an errand. When she arrived, she pulled the teacher aside, asked what the emergency was and found that her colleague went to the store to buy a new pair of shoes for one of her students.

The little boy had outgrown his old shoes and cut a hole in the front so that his toes were peeking out -- but winter was on its way and his teacher couldn't bear to see him in shoes that would give him no protection against the frost.

Rosa's story about an exceptional teacher highlighted what is, unfortunately, an unexceptional tale across America. Today, nearly one in four American children is living in poverty. In Clarendon County, where the childhood poverty rate is more than 38 percent, it's one in three children. Growing up in poverty means having fallen 18 months behind your peers developmentally by age four. And the negative effects continue throughout high school, at which point 32 percent of those who lived in poverty for more than half their lives will never graduate, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation's 2011 report "Double Jeopardy."

It's hard for lawmakers to address issues like these when there's a distinct possibility that the century-long rivalry between Clemson and USC may one day come to an end!

Something must be done! The law must guarantee that Clemson and USC will play their annual games until the end of time! Let's hear it for Clemson and USC football!

But rather than throw out more harrowing numbers and statistics, I have asked Ms. Dingle to share a first-hand account of what it really means to grow up poor in a rich country -- and why she sees early education as key to breaking the cycle of poverty. After all, the born-and-bred Clarendon County resident is speaking from personal experience.

A note from Rosa Dingle, Ed.S
Principal, St. Paul Elementary School, Summerton, S.C.

Aside from the addition of computers and email, not much else has improved in Clarendon County schools since my days as a student here. Poverty is just as prevalent today as it was when I was growing up. Over the past several years, one business after another has closed down, leaving none to fuel our school district with tax revenue or employ local residents.

Today, a strip of mostly boarded-up shops lines the picturesque downtown of Summerton, where I now work as the principal of St. Paul Elementary School. The biggest blow to the area's economy came in September 2010 with the shutdown of Summerton's Federal Mogul Plant, a global automotive supplier that, during its heyday, employed 800 workers in a town of just over 1,000 residents.

With so many parents losing their jobs, the majority of students in my school--many from single-parent households--qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. One of the parents recently told me that she was heating her home using the oven because there was no heat in the house. And stories of students whose parents can't afford to buy them winter clothes and shoes (such as the boy I told Carolyn about) are all too common.

If I were cynical, Ms. Dingle, I'd tell you to wait until these children are old enough to play football for Clemson and USC -- woo hoo! -- and then, regardless of their impoverished background, boosters -- and maybe even South Carolina's lawmakers -- will move heaven and earth to see that they have plenty of warm clothes to wear, so long as they're able to get that ball through in the endzone and through the uprights.

But I'm not cynical.

And I don't see our lawmakers moving to change things any time soon.

If our children have to worry about where their next meal is coming from, or how to keep warm, their school work will inevitably suffer. Many parents of the students in my school can barely afford life's basic necessities, let alone books. As a result, too many children at St. Paul Elementary read two to three years below their grade level. Having worked at a high school for several years, I know what it's like for students to be so far behind, they want to give up.

That's why, at the elementary school level, I feel personally responsible to make sure each student is prepared for middle school and beyond.

Which is way more than our legislators feel. Sometime when you're in Columbia on a Tuesday or Wednesday evening, find out where that evening's legislative reception is being held -- there's usually one every Tuesday and Wednesday night, and they're not difficult to slip into -- and you can ask a dozen or two of them yourself how much they feel responsible for the preparation of their poorest constituents' children.

After a few blank stares and uncomfortable grins from them, you may get the sense that not many of our elected leaders share your commitment to children. Other people's children, that is.

It is imperative that we give every child, every chance, every day an opportunity to succeed. In spite of the limited resources and personnel, our students come to school with their heads held high, smiling and willing to learn. I even catch some of them reading books as they are walking to class.

If we want to break the cycle of poverty, we need to ensure that our children excel academically. Our vision for St. Paul Elementary School is to establish and maintain high expectations for all--no exceptions! I often tell my students my personal story, which resonates with many of them. I didn't know who my father was until I was 18 years old. Raised by my grandmother right here in Clarendon County, I faced many of the same challenges. Education was the way out of poverty for me. And it can -- and should -- be for my students, too.

Thank you, Ms. Dingle.

Romney not concerned with "very poor," but educators are.

Today's Atlanta Journal-Constitution is reporting that former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, fresh from a decisive win in the Florida presidential primary, has announced that he's "not concerned about the very poor."

...Romney emphasized, "You can focus on the very poor, that's not my focus."

Thank goodness that public school educators and school district employees are focused on the very poor; many of the children enrolled in South Carolina's public schools fall well within that category.

In context, Romney attempted to assert that America provides an "ample safety net" for people who are very poor, so his focus is on America's middle class. Except that there are two flaws in his assertion. One is that what he considers an ample safety net is pretty pathetic -- if you're homeless due to home foreclosures, and don't know where your meals and health care are coming from, the poorly-funded services available through state and federal agencies, and the paltry aid offered by churches and civic groups, don't really add up to first-class American citizenship.

The second is that the policies that Romney has articulated don't really help the incredible shrinking middle class, either.

He brought up the subject of the poor in a CNN interview marking his big win in Florida's GOP primary Tuesday night, a major step toward becoming the party's challenger to President Barack Obama in the fall. A multi-millionaire former venture capitalist, Romney has been criticized by Democrats and his Republican rivals alike for earlier remarks seen as insensitive, such as saying "I like being able to fire people" and declaring that he knew what it was like to worry about being "pink-slipped" out of a job.

"I'm not concerned about the very poor." he said Wednesday. "We have a safety net there. If it needs repair, I'll fix it.

Mitt Romney, fixer. He'll fix the safety net for the very poor, he says. "Fix" has two definitions: One means to repair something that needs repair, the other means to freeze a thing in place, as in "price-fixing." Which do you think he means?

Asked whether his comment about the poor might come across as odd to some, Romney reiterated.

"We will hear from the Democrat party the plight of the poor and there's no question, it's not good being poor, and we have a safety net to help those that are very poor," Romney said, adding that he's more worried about the unemployed, people living on Social Security and those struggling to send their kids to college.

"We have a very ample safety net and we can talk about whether it needs to be strengthened or whether there are holes in it. But we have food stamps, we have Medicaid, we have housing vouchers, we have programs to help the poor," Romney said.

Indeed, far from the days of workhouses for the poor, and debtors' prisons, and Skid Row.

We, in the land of plenty, have food stamps and Medicaid for the very poor, which approximates a kingly living, to be sure. And the children of the very poor, you can safely assume, are enrolled in public schools, where public school educators and school district employees see them, care for them and TEACH them every day.

Poor Mitt Romney. He deserves our sympathy, truly. Aside from the daily trials and tribulations of a presidential campaign, he has another steep hill to climb: Understanding and identifying with those who weren't born into privilege, who have had to raise children and balance a household budget on hourly wages, who have had to make thousands of compromises of principle and pride over their careers to keep their jobs and their livelihoods. We have to remember, reaching out to the mass of Americans, and asking for their votes, is a gargantuan task.

He is, after all, used to being able to buy what he wants.

Just how rich is Mitt Romney? Add up the wealth of the last eight presidents, from Richard Nixon to Barack Obama. Then double that number. Now you're in Romney territory. He would be among the richest presidents in American history if elected – probably in the top four.

He couldn't top George Washington who, with nearly 60,000 acres and more than 300 slaves, is considered the big daddy of presidential wealth.
...
But it's safe to say the Roosevelts had nothing on Romney, and the Bushes are nowhere close.

The former Massachusetts governor has disclosed only the broad outlines of his wealth, putting it somewhere from $190 million to $250 million. That easily could make him 50 times richer than Obama, who falls in the still-impressive-to-most-of-us range of $2.2 million to $7.5 million.

"I think it's almost hard to conceptualize what $250 million means," said Shamus Khan, a Columbia University sociologist who studies the wealthy. "People say Romney made $50,000 a day while not working last year. What do you do with all that money? I can't even imagine spending it. Well, maybe ..."

Of course, an unbelievable boatload of bucks is just one way to think of Romney's net worth, and the 44 U.S. presidents make up a pretty small pond for him to swim in.
...
So here's a look where Romney's riches rank – among the most flush Americans, the White House contenders, and the rest of us:

-Within the 1 percent:
...
A household needs to bring in roughly $400,000 per year to make the cut. Romney and his wife, Ann, have been making 50 times that – more than $20 million a year. In 2009, only 8,274 federal tax filers had income above $10 million. Romney is solidly within that elite 0.006 percent of all U.S. taxpayers.
...
-As a potential president:

Romney clearly stands out here. America's super rich generally don't jockey to live in the White House. A few have toyed with the idea, most notably New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, whom Forbes ranks as the 12th richest American, worth $19.5 billion. A lesser billionaire, Ross Perot, bankrolled his own third-party campaigns in 1992 and 1996.

Many presidents weren't particularly well-off, especially 19th century leaders such as Abraham Lincoln, James Buchanan and Ulysses S. Grant. Nor was the 33rd president, Harry Truman.

"These things ebb and flow," said sociologist Khan. "It's not the case that all presidents were always rich."

-How does Romney stand next to a regular Joe? He's roughly 1,800 times richer.

The typical U.S. household was worth $120,300 in 2007, according to the Census Bureau's most recent data, although that number is sure to have dropped since the recession. A typical family's income is $50,000.

Calculations from 24/7 Wall St. of the peak lifetime wealth (or peak so far) of Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Obama add up to a total $128 million – while Romney reports assets of up to $250 million.

If you consider only those presidents' assets while in office, without millions earned later from speeches and books, their combined total would be substantially lower, and Romney's riches would leave the pack even further behind.

Poor Mitt Romney.

No wonder he isn't focused on the very poor. He can't imagine that they exist.

Some South Carolina facts for discussion in quiet rooms

Some fascinating facts about South Carolina's people, wealth, businesses and home ownership were updated by the U.S. Census Bureau late last month, and they offer a snapshot worth considering.

Here are only a few notes:

How many are we? Our 2010 population totaled 4.625 million, an increase of 15.3 percent over the 2000 census. It would appear that despite all the rhetoric advising Americans not to complete and return their census forms, South Carolinians did.

How old are we? Of that total population in 2010, nearly a quarter -- 23.4 percent -- were under the age of 18. Senior citizens -- those age 65 and over -- accounted for 13.7 percent of our total.

What is our dominant gender? At 51.4 percent of the total, women outnumber men.

What color are we? Representing 66.2 percent of the population, whites outnumber everyone else. The next largest minority is African-Americans, with 27.9 percent of the total. Hispanic or Latino respondents accounted for 5.1 percent.

How safe is our border? For all the Sturm und Drang over immigration -- which has always been a bee in South Carolinians' collective bonnet -- foreign-born persons represent only 4.4 percent of our residents, well below the national figure is 12.4 percent. So why the xenophobia?

How many of us have served the nation? According to data collected between 2005 and 2009, South Carolina is home to a shade less than 400,000 veterans, roughly 1.73 percent of the nation's total of 22,894,578.

How educated are we? The good news is that 82.2 percent of South Carolinians, age 25 and older, have graduated from high school; the bad news is that the other 17.8 percent of us haven't. Only 23.5 percent of us hold bachelor's degrees or more advanced degrees.

How many houses do we have? Our total "housing units" are 2.137 million, but 17 percent of those are in multi-unit structures -- presumably beach condos, apartments and dormitories.

How many own our homes? There are 1.693 million "households" in our state, with an average 2.52 persons per household, and 70.3 percent of us own homes.

How wealthy are we? We're rolling in filthy lucre, by medieval standards. South Carolinians earned $23,196 per capita, in 2009 dollars, in the 12 months before being surveyed. Our median household income in 2009 was $42,580 -- roughly 12 percent of Mitt Romney's income from public speaking fees last year.

How many of us live in poverty? South Carolinians living below the poverty level in 2009 totaled 17.1 percent of us. That's three percent higher than the national average.

However, those South Carolinians in business are really in business.

How many "firms" are based in South Carolina? 360,397 in 2007. Of that number, only 12 percent were owned by African-Americans, 1.8 percent were owned by citizens of Asian heritage, and 1.7 percent were owned by Hispanic/Latino citizens. Women owned fewer than a third: only 27.6 percent.

But some of us have made out like bandits: We shipped nearly $94 billion in manufactured goods in 2007, we booked more $40 billion in merchant wholesale sales in 2007, and our retailers did more than $54 billion in business the same year. In fact, our retail sales per capita in 2007 totaled $12,273 -- which is striking, given that it represents half of our per capita income.

What does this tell us? Maybe that the average South Carolinian is a white female, between 18 and 65, with a high school diploma but no college degree, who earns less than $25,000 annually and who doesn't live alone, and who has a much greater chance of knowing someone who lives in poverty than of knowing a veteran.

Is this an appropriate topic to discuss in the public square, as a matter of public policy, or should we -- as Mitt Romney advises -- only talk about these things in "quiet rooms"?

I like how editorialist Eric Zorn put it, in an op-ed published last week in the Chicago Tribune:

Inside voices everyone, please!

We're going to talk about the widening income gap between rich and poor, tax policy and the seemliness of predatory investing, and GOP presidential front-runner Mitt Romney wants us to do so only "in quiet rooms."

He made this suggestion in an interview Wednesday with NBC "Today" host Matt Lauer, the relevant portion of which began when Lauer challenged Romney's assertion in his victory speech Tuesday after the New Hampshire primary that questions about his lucrative career in high finance are rooted in "the bitter politics of envy."

"I think it's about envy," Romney replied. "I think it's about class warfare. I think when you have a president encouraging the idea of dividing America based on 99 percent vs. 1 percent, and those people who've been most successful will be in the 1 percent, you've opened up a whole new wave of approach in this country which is entirely inconsistent with the concept of one nation under God."

Had I been in Lauer's chair, I would have reminded Romney that "under God" was added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954, when top-bracket earners paid a 91 percent federal income tax rate. They now pay 35 percent, and yet Republicans howl that those who want to move it back up to 39 percent, where it was through most of the 1990s, are "socialists."

Instead, Lauer asked, "Are there no fair questions about the distribution of wealth without it being seen as envy, though?"

"You know I think it's fine to talk about those things in quiet rooms," Romney said. "But the president has made this part of his campaign rally. Everywhere he goes we hear him talking about millionaires and billionaires and executives and Wall Street. It's a very envy-oriented, attack-oriented approach."

Attack? Yes. Politics isn't beanbag as Romney himself reminded us recently. And harsh criticism of opponents' records and philosophies is common, as the broadsides against President Barack Obama in Romney's stinging, hyperbolic victory speech illustrated.

But envy? No. Envy requires bitter resentment, and most of us don't resent or begrudge the material success of the industrious, the talented or even the lucky — Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, say, or Oprah Winfrey, Derrick Rose, Steven Spielberg and Scott Anetsberger, the Lombard man who, we just learned, hit the $1 million jackpot in the Illinois Lottery's Merry Millionaire scratch-off game twice in nine years.

I'd even go so far as to say the vast majority of Americans admire successful venture capitalists — those who get rich investing in the ideas of ambitious entrepreneurs (whom we also admire), thus creating new products and businesses that fuel economic growth.

That's free enterprise. And despite Romney's complaint that those in both parties who are critical of his tenure at Bain Capital investment firm "want to put free enterprise on trial," no one in the political mainstream is challenging its basics.

What they are challenging are the rules of high finance that allow private equity firms like Bain to sweep in, buy up mature companies, gut and restructure them with heavy infusions of other people's money, then bail out with handsome profits even when the company may be headed for bankruptcy.

"There's a big difference between financial manipulation and capitalism," said Newt Gingrich, the GOP candidate whose technically unaffiliated political action committee will spend a reported $5 million in South Carolina this week to promote and air "When Mitt Romney Came To Town," a 28-minute video that portrays Romney the businessman as rapacious, heartless and obtuse.

Others critics are challenging a tax system that has allowed wealth to concentrate more and more at the top, impeded income mobility and hit particularly hard at middle-income families, losers in a class war they did not start.

They want to put on trial a structure that bails out bankers in trouble but shrugs off the woes of the unemployed and the foreclosed as part of the "creative destruction" necessary for growth.

They're angry, not envious.

As a relatively calm person, I support Romney's implicit call for polite, reasoned discourse here. But it won't happen until he sets an example, stops flinging self-pitying accusations and acknowledges that his foes and critics have reasonable concerns about fairness and growing income inequality. He could start by allowing that it isn't anti-God and anti-capitalism insisting that we do better by those destroyed in the cycle of creative destruction.

In other words, expect a lot of noise in the coming months.

Charles Dickens was right: Poor people care more for others

Don't take my word for it. U.S News and World Report quotes the journal Emotion, which published last month its findings that "the more affluent face fewer obstacles" and are "slower to recognize the suffering of others" than people with fewer resources. More than that, poor people are quicker to act on their empathy -- to show compassion for their fellow sufferers.

The findings challenge previous research that concluded lower-class people are more likely to react with anxiety and hostility when faced with adversity, said the researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

"These latest results indicate that there's a culture of compassion and cooperation among lower-class individuals that may be born out of threats to their well-being," study author and social psychologist Jennifer Stellar said in a university news release.

Might this help to explain why poor South Carolinians care enough about the education of their children, and the children of other poor South Carolinians, that they consistently vote to raise their own property taxes to pay for improved schools, programs and services, while wealthy South Carolinians in the legislature are content to underfund the Education Finance Act year after year?

Hm?

"It's not that the upper classes are cold-hearted. They may just not be as adept at recognizing the cues and signals of suffering because they haven't had to deal with as many obstacles in their lives," she explained.

The findings, published online Dec. 12 in the journal Emotion, suggest a scientific basis for emotional differences between the rich and poor that are depicted in such Charles Dickens classics as "A Christmas Carol" and "A Tale of Two Cities."

The results also indicate that people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds may do better in cooperative settings than those who are wealthy.

"Upper-class individuals appear to be more self-focused, they've grown up with more freedom and autonomy," Stellar said. "They may do better in an individualist, competitive environment."

Half of South Carolina's children live in poverty; lawmakers consider more budget cuts

It is accurate to call news "news" if it isn't new, and if everyone already knew it?

From last Friday's Charleston Post & Courier came "news" that shouldn't surprise anyone living in South Carolina. Perhaps it was meant to be news to readers from outside the state, though it's doubtful that any non-Carolinians would be shocked to see it printed again.

The news? A report from a quasi-legislative committee has concluded that nearly half of South Carolina's children live in poverty. And the legislature (a) offers no solutions to the problem and (b) continues to ponder which of a myriad cuts it will inflict to programs and services for the state's poorest citizens.

The newspaper's report calls to mind the old puzzler: What do you do when you find you've dug yourself into a hole? The answer seems to depend on whether your hole is dug into South Carolina's red clay or the soil of some other state. Elsewhere, you might throw down the shovel and call for help to climb out; in South Carolina, we double-down on digging.

An excerpt:

Nearly half of the state's 1 million residents under 18 "lived in some officially measured degree of poverty" last year, according to a report issued Thursday. About half of all children qualified for Medicaid benefits in any given month, and more than one-third received subsidized school meals.

The 35-page report from the Joint Citizens and Legislative Committee on Children is meant to provide lawmakers with information they can use to make policy and funding decisions, its authors said.

The report offers no concrete recommendations, only an acknowledgement of current economic challenges and the general admonition that political decisions should strike a balance between the need for budget reductions and the obligations to the state's children.

The Courier says it's been nearly two decades since this Committee issued its last report. Why? It was "unfunded" for most of that time and revived just three years ago -- despite its unique mission:

The bi-partisan joint committee, which consists of six appointed legislators, three appointed citizens and six state agency officials, is the only political body that considers all aspects of child welfare in South Carolina.

Child welfare is clearly not a priority to the modern legislature. Of the various programs and services designed to help poor children, which do you expect to be protected by lawmakers this year?

Lawmakers are grappling with a $700 million budget gap and have said that no state program, including services to children, is immune to cuts.

None of them. Which means that unless South Carolinians choose to make changes themselves, we'll see the same report issued in another 20 years, and another 20 years, and another...

Here's a snapshot of the Committee's finding on public health and impoverished children:

Many children in the state go without health insurance, are inadequately immunized against disease and suffer from obesity and chronic illness.

--More than 136,000 children in South Carolina had no health insurance in 2009.

--Approximately 20 percent of the state's children are not getting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's recommended dosage of vaccinations by age 2.

--More than one-third of high school students are obese or overweight.

--25 percent of low-income children, ages 2-5, are obese or overweight.

--Research shows obese teens tend to stay obese, gaining an average of 80 more pounds as they become adults, and leading to chronic health problems, such as diabetes, heart disease, arthritis and cancer.

--Thousands of children suffer from asthma, and 5,680 were hospitalized for it in 2008.

--Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes were diagnosed in about 2,000 children in 2007.

On the topic of child welfare, the Committee reported:

According to the law, the state must intervene when parents or legal guardians abuse or neglect their children.

--About 19,000 cases of possible abuse or neglect were referred to the Department of Social Services in 2010, and 6,705 cases were found to be legitimate, affecting more than 12,000 children.

--8,800 children were neglected or threatened by neglect; 2,900 were threatened by physical abuse; 1,500 were injured by physical abuse.

--Victims include young witnesses of siblings being abused.

--About half of abuse victims are 5 years old or younger.

--Financial strain, substance abuse and mental disorders contribute to higher levels of abuse and neglect.

And how many of South Carolina's children live in families where there is financial strain?

Nearly 200,000 children in the state, about 20 percent, are officially recognized as "poor".

--463,000 children in the state live in families considered "low-income," according to government measures.

--1 in 5 children living in poverty have emotional or behavioral problems.

--328,000 public school students received subsidized meals in 2008-2009.

--Nearly half of all children in public schools received assistance to obtain proper nutrition.

--The state Medicaid program, administered by the Department of Health and Human Services, ensures that the poor and disabled receive basic health care, but the agency faces a budget shortfall of $228 million.

--Two-thirds of Medicaid recipients are part of working families but do not earn enough to afford insurance.

Does our state do enough to prioritize and address the welfare of its poorest children? Or their parents?

Does it matter?