The Price of Tomorrow: Why South Carolina Families Are Afraid of the Future

For families across the state, the dream of a home is still alive—but affordability is shaping what tomorrow looks like. /CUBNSC

A CUBN Quality of Life Report

By Columbia Urban Broadcast Network (CUBNSC)

A Shared Crisis with Unequal Pressure

Across South Carolina, a quiet but powerful shift is taking place inside living rooms, break rooms, churches, and late-night conversations between young adults unsure of what their lives will look like ten years from now.

What began as a struggle felt most sharply in Black and low-income communities has expanded outward. Today, the affordability crisis is universal, stretching across race, age, and geography.

The Black family still carries the deepest historical burdens—centuries of targeted economic exclusion, gaps in generational wealth, and disproportionate caregiving responsibilities. But now the pain is shared in unexpected ways. Middle-class white families, Latino families, young people of all backgrounds, and seniors across the state are all facing the same impossible math.

For the first time in decades, South Carolina households are united not by politics, but by fear:

Can we afford to have a future here?

Working Harder, Falling Behind

Jobs Are Up—but Quality of Life Is Down

Latino families, like so many others across the state, are working hard to build a future despite rising costs and shrinking opportunities.

South Carolina’s unemployment rate has decreased over the last year, and employers report thousands of open positions. Yet real wages haven’t kept pace with increasing costs. Median household income in the state lags far behind the national median, and gains are swallowed by rising rent, health insurance premiums, utilities, and food prices.

Young workers say it plainly:

“I can get a job. What I can’t get is a life I can afford.”

Even two-income households—once the backbone of stability—now struggle to survive unexpected expenses, childcare bills, or medical emergencies. Many South Carolinians live one paycheck away from disaster.

Black families, in particular, remain overrepresented in low-wage and essential work sectors, often juggling multiple part-time jobs with no benefits. The promise of hard work leading to upward mobility has thinned to a whisper.

Housing Costs Are Breaking the Middle Class

In South Carolina, about 1 in 2 renters are officially “cost-burdened,” meaning rent eats up a third or more of their income.

Housing, the foundation of family stability, is now the biggest barrier to a dignified life.

Half of renters and a quarter of homeowners in South Carolina are “housing cost–burdened”

spending 30% or more of their income on shelter—an unsustainable rate that forces tradeoffs between rent, food, child care, and health care.

In Richland County, the pressures are both economic and emotional. Rents are rising, starter homes are out of reach, and aging housing stock leaves families battling mold, leaks, pests, and unsafe conditions they can’t afford to repair.

For younger adults, the message is unmistakable:

There is no clear path to homeownership anymore.

The Cost of Raising a Family Has Become a Moving Target

The fear of having children is now common.

Not hypothetical. Not symbolic. Real.

A generation raised during recessions, pandemics, student loan crises, and political turmoil is looking at the numbers—and choosing caution. Nearly half of childless adults under 50 nationwide say they don’t expect to have children. Many cite finances as the number-one reason.

In South Carolina:

• Infant childcare can cost as much as $10,000+ per year.

• Single parents often spend 30% or more of their income on childcare alone.

• Married couples, even with two incomes, report delaying or rethinking plans for children.

  
  

The affordability of parenthood has become a luxury—one fewer and fewer people can imagine.

Black families shoulder this burden at even higher rates due to persistent wage gaps, higher exposure to unstable housing markets, and lower access to employer-based health coverage.

Older Adults Are Caring for the Young While Struggling Themselves

Intergenerational homes are becoming more common as rising costs reshape what family stability looks like in South Carolina.

Richland County is home to a growing population of older adults, and many are raising grandchildren or supporting adult children who can’t make ends meet.

These “grandfamilies” are becoming more common across race and class, but the strain is particularly heavy in Black households, where multigenerational caregiving has long been a survival strategy.

Yet many seniors:

• Are on fixed incomes,

• Face high medical costs,

• And struggle with their own housing insecurity.

  
  

They are carrying a future they may not be able to afford.

The Emotional Toll: Anxiety Is Becoming a Way of Life

The affordability crisis isn’t just economic—it’s deeply psychological.

South Carolinians report growing fear about:

• Losing housing

• Affording health care

• Paying unexpected bills

• Raising children in uncertain times

• The stability of their neighborhoods

• The competence and honesty of their government

In discussions across the Midlands, it’s clear: people don’t lack hope—they lack stability.

And instability is the one thing families of all backgrounds cannot build on.

A Rare Point of Unity: We Are All in the Same Boat

South Carolina has always been marked by racial divides. But today’s affordability crisis paints a rare picture of shared struggle.

Young Black, white, Latino, and immigrant South Carolinians all express fear about raising children.

Older adults across racial lines worry about affording medication or maintaining a home.

Working families, Black and white, feel the economy is no longer designed for people like them.

Our pain is shared. Our pressure is shared. Our future is shared.

This doesn’t erase the unique historic and current challenges Black families face—those inequities are real and persistent. But the magnitude of today’s crisis has created a collective experience that reaches far beyond one community.

Before We Can Change the Future, We Must Understand It

Columbia, South Carolina's capital, remains more affordable than many cities nationwide, but within South Carolina it sits near the middle—offering big-city amenities at a cost that is no longer the lowest, yet still more manageable than rapidly growing regions like Charleston and Greenville.

South Carolinians are not imagining the crisis—they are living it.

The fear is real.

The math doesn’t add up.

And the anxiety of today is shaping decisions that will echo for generations.

But in this shared struggle lies an opportunity:

to see each other differently, to understand each other’s fears, and to recognize how intertwined our futures truly are.

Before we fix anything, we must listen.

Before we propose solutions, we must hear the truth.

We must all work together to create a more balanced government 

One that focuses on people power, not political parties! 

Reference Reading:

Child Care Aware of America. Affordability of Child Care for Families: 2024–2025 Price & Supply Report – South Carolina. Child Care Aware, 2024.

— PDF: “The median income for a married couple is $110,894, which means center-based child care for an infant would use 9% of family income; … for a single parent family ($35,510) it would be 30%.” 

“South Carolina | Data USA.” Data USA, 2023, datausa.io/profile/geo/south-carolina. “In the year of 2023 … median household income $66,818.” 

“What is the income of a household in South Carolina?” USAFacts, accessed 2025, usafacts.org/answers/what-is-the-income-of-a-us-household/state/south-carolina/. “Median household income was $72.4K in 2024… 11.3% lower than the U.S. median.” 

Neilsberg Research. “South Carolina Median Household Income: Trends, Analysis, and Key Findings.” Neilsberg, 3 Mar. 2025, neilsberg.com/insights/south-carolina-median-household-income/. “The median household income in South Carolina was $66,818 in 2023… 85.08% of the U.S. median.” 

“Child Care and Early Learning in South Carolina.” First Five Years Fund, 5 Sept. 2025, ffyf.org/states/south-carolina/. “Working families in South Carolina need accessible, affordable, quality child care… too many working families … missing out.” 

“Median Household Income by County 2011-2021 | South Carolina.” SC Revenue & Fiscal Affairs Office, rfa.sc.gov/data-research/population-demographics/census-state-data-center/mhi-county-2011-2020. “For Richland County…”