MIKE HAMEL grew up in Providence. He went to work at the age of 16 at Regal Plating on South Street, drying the jewelry produced at the plant. He has been working ever since. He served for more than four years in the U.S. Air Force, 1967-71. He’s a union guy, a member of the Teamsters. He’s 60 now.

He has never asked for a handout. Working and providing (he’s the father of two grown children) are all he knows.

As far as he can tell, nobody is lobbying for him on Smith Hill. The Rhode Island General Assembly seems uninterested in the private-sector working stiff, other than as a host on which to affix itself and remove ever-increasing tax dollars.

“They don’t care about me. They pander to the special interests, and they pander to each other,” he said. “I don’t refer to them as the General Assembly. I call them the Board of Directors of the Rhode Island Public Employee Unions. That is a more accurate description of the job they perform.”

But, inevitably, that approach is catching up to the state. Businesses are being driven out at a frightening clip. Jobs and tax revenues are disappearing. A massive budget deficit has opened up, making it harder to provide services and care for the poor. And the future looks bleak, unless politicians who have never been so inclined before suddenly recognize that Rhode Island must re-orient itself — with policies that promote job creation, better schools focused on students, cheaper energy and less corruption, while bringing the cost of government in line with the taxpayers’ ability to afford it.

Unfortunately, such a change — if it ever comes — will come too late for Mr. Hamel, and too many other good men and women like him.

Last November, he learned that he was going to lose his job. Clariant Corp. announced it was shutting down its plant in Coventry before the end of 2008, eliminating 120 positions — including Mr. Hamel’s, supervising the operation of the boilers — and moving production to its plants in Germany and Mexico. It had become too costly to do the work in a state with such brutally high costs.

Mr. Hamel is going to lose his $60,000-a-year job, with benefits. That scares him. He has already gone to Clariant plants in North Carolina and Texas, looking for work, hoping to stay with the company he has served for decades. It doesn’t look good. He fears he will have to go onto unemployment — and, worse, lose his health benefits.

Several years ago, he nearly lost his life with a lung infection. He was in a coma for five days and lost two-thirds of his right lung. If he faces another such hospital stay without insurance, he will be destroyed financially. “I might as well just die when I’m in there,” he said.

Mr. Hamel’s story is a familiar one, unfortunately. At the end of 2006, there were only 52,726 manufacturing jobs left in the state, down a whopping 22 percent from five years earlier. Manufacturing jobs tend to be high-paying with good benefits.

That is the story everywhere in America. But, unlike other states, Rhode Island has not tried to respond to the loss by encouraging the creation of new jobs. Instead, its politicians have enacted tax, energy and regulatory policies that make it difficult if not impossible for businesses to survive or relocate here. The Tax Foundation’s 2007 State Business Tax Climate Index ranked Rhode Island dead last — 50th out of 50 states — while the Small Business Survival Index ranked us 48th out of 50, as did CNBC’s Top States in America for Business.

Indeed, a large number of politicians — led by Sen. Paul Moura (D.-East Providence) and Rep. Arthur Handy (D.-Cranston) — are even now pushing for massive tax hikes that would surely further hammer our economy.

“The state does not seem to comprehend what is happening out here in the real world. It’s almost like when they walk into the State House, they walk into Disneyland,” Mr. Hamel said.

Mr. Hamel says he has no party affiliation. He is largely self-taught. He reads and takes courses.

In his view, neither party is addressing Rhode Island’s problems. Governor Carcieri, for example, has blocked development of a port at Quonset Point that could create jobs and generate economic activity throughout the region. “That’s such an asinine project down there, it’s not funny,” he says of the governor’s Quonset development.

He believes change can only come when newcomers arrive, especially citizens committed to public education, who will not stand idly by as special interests feast off tax dollars while starving the students.

“This is a world economy now. Rhode Island has to learn to become a world player. We have to do a much better job educating our children. Let’s face it: They are not ready to be players on the world stage,” he said.

But Mr. Hamel has little faith the democratic system will produce the reforms the state needs any time soon. When he talks to his neighbors about throwing the bums out of office, “They say, ‘Ah, they’re all the same.’ ”

“It’s become so ingrained in the Rhode Island voter. It’s passed on from parents to children.”

People here accept bad government, and re-elect politicians who have zero sympathy for the Mike Hamels of this world. Unfortunately, Rhode Island is about to discover how costly such a government can be, because it is the Mike Hamels of the world who pay the freight — and keep the whole racket going.

Edward Achorn is The Journal’s deputy editorial-pages editor ( eachorn@projo.com).