Consumer finances in rural Appalachia have fallen even farther behind the rest of the nation in the last 20 years

A new report from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau examines the financial challenges faced by residents of rural counties in Appalachia. "On average, rural Appalachians earn less than other rural people across the country and significantly less than non-rural consumers," CFPB says.

Strikingly, the income gap is growing: "While the median rural Appalachian household income was 89% of the national median in 1999, it was only 69% of the national median in 2020." 

A possible contributing factor: "The share of rural Appalachians attending at least some college lies far below the national average—53% compared to 67% nationally."

Appalachians also have far less access to high-speed internet, says the report: "Only 76% of households in rural Appalachia have access to broadband, compared to 85% of households nationally. Eighteen counties—overwhelmingly in rural areas—lag with rates below 60%."

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau map, adapted by The Rural Blog

Credit-card statistics suggest that Appalachians from the poorest rural counties, those classified as "persistent poverty counties," are less likely to qualify for a card, and that those who do have a card are less likely to be able to pay it off, even though they tend to have lower than average balances on their cards. Appalachians in persistent-poverty counties were less likely to have a credit card and carried a lower average credit card balance than other rural Appalachians, other rural non-Appalachians, or the nationwide average. But those in rural persistent-poverty counties who did have a credit card were more likely to use it than those in other groups, and were more more likely to have delinquent debt on at least one credit card.

"Rural Appalachians are more likely to have a subprime or deep subprime credit score compared to all consumers nationally and consumers in the rest of rural America, which typically leads to a higher cost of credit," the report says. "Rural Appalachians are also more likely than consumers in other parts of the country to have medical debt collections on their credit record."