A digest of events, trends, issues, ideas and journalism from and about rural America, by the Institute for Rural Journalism, based at the University of Kentucky.
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A change in federal policy during the 1980's created modern-day "food deserts" in poor and rural communities. While the revision was intended "to reward the biggest retail chains for their efficiency," writes Stacy Mitchell in her opinion for The Atlantic, it put local grocery stores out of business while increasing food costs in areas already hampered by poverty and depopulation. . . . "Food deserts will not go away until that mistake is reversed."
Historically, local grocery stores were shielded by the Robinson-Patman Act. "The law essentially bans price discrimination, making it illegal for suppliers to offer preferential deals and for retailers to demand them. It does, however, allow businesses to pass along legitimate savings," Mitchell explains. For more than four decades, the Robinson-Patman Act successfully maintained the delicate balance of U.S. grocery store competition between big chains and local stores.
In the 1980s, the Reagan administration didn't agree with the "tough antitrust enforcement" that previous administrations had provided through the Robinson-Patman Act, so "the government simply stopped enforcing it," Mitchell writes. "That move tipped the retail market in favor of the largest chains. . . .Walmart was the first to fully grasp the implications of the new legal terrain. It soon became notorious for aggressively strong-arming suppliers, a strategy that fueled its rapid expansion."
Once the Robinson-Patman Act was dismantled, independent grocers and smaller supply businesses couldn't compete on price and were squeezed out of their neighborhood markets. "Price discrimination spread beyond groceries, hobbling bookstores, pharmacies, and many other local businesses," Mitchell reports. "From 1982 to 2017, the market share of independent retailers shrank from 53% to 22%."
Meanwhile, mega-retailers such as Walmart and Safeway continue to dominate sales but still fail to meet needs in rural communities. Why? They don't have to. "Walmart can capture spending across a wide region by locating its supercenters in larger towns."
Stacy Mitchell (Photo by Brian Fitzgerald via ILSR)
To create an economic atmosphere where smaller local grocers and retailers could succeed, the Robinson-Patman Act will need to be revived and applied. Mitchell adds,"Requiring a level pricing playing field would restore local retailers’ ability to compete. This would provide immediate relief to entrepreneurs who have recently opened grocery stores in food deserts, only to find that their inability to buy on the same terms as Walmart and Dollar General makes survival difficult."
Stacy Mitchell is a co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, where her research focuses on economic concentration and the health of local economies.
Rossif Sutherland and Kristin Kreuk star in the new Global/FOX
series 'Murder in a Small Town.' (Global TVvia IMDb photo/The Daily
Yonder)
There's nothing quite like small-town murder tales to get people glued to their television screens week after week. "The latest TV series on FOX puts its own spin on a genre that has stood the test of time," reports Keith Roysdon of The Daily Yonder. "We haven’t yet reached the point where it’s become obvious that something is very, very wrong in the town of Gibsons . . . . 'Murder in a Small Town' is good, dependable murder-of-the-week television, probably not dissimilar to how 'Murder, She Wrote' was perceived for most of its run."
In Lancaster County, Penn., Democrats see an opportunity even though the county typically votes Republican, "the demographics are shifting here and throughout the state," report Campbell Robertson and Robert Gebeloff of The New York Times. "Pennsylvania is arguably the most pivotal state in the election, carrying 19 electoral votes, the most of the so-called swing states. After voting for the Democrat in every presidential election going back to 1992, the state went for Donald J. Trump in 2016 by less than a percentage point. Joe Biden won in 2020, by a little over a percentage point."
Jim
and Sharon Erwin enjoy the natural beauty of Gunnison, Colo.(Photo by Jim Erwin via WSJ)
As baby boomers head into retirement, some choose to resettle in rural places for reasons that range from cutting costs to living closer to natural attractions. "The move to remote mountain and lake areas is helping reverse a long decline in the rural population. From April 2020 to July 2023, the rural counties retirees flocked to grew 4% versus less than 1% for rural America as a whole," report Anne Tergesen and Veronica Dagher of The Wall Street Journal.
If slower is cheaper, is that OK? That depends. "The U.S. Postal Service is moving forward with a plan to slow down delivery for a relatively small portion of mail, telling its regulator the changes would save nearly $4 billion annually and better reflect the evolving nature of mail usage," reports Eric Katz of Route Fifty. Advocates for rural residents say the change will disproportionately affect mail delivery and pickup in more remote areas. Liz Carey of The Daily Yonderreports, "The plan would eliminate evening mail pickup in rural and remote areas, which could affect delivery times for areas that are more than 50 miles from a large USPS regional processing facility."
Apple's AirPods Pro 2 with hearing aid feature (Apple photo via Wired)
Over-the-counter hearing aids seemed like a "cheaper and more accessible [solution] for people with mild to moderate hearing loss. Instead, people are returning them at high rates," reports Julie Jargon of The Wall Street Journal. "Doctors lauded the move as a solution for over 20 million American adults who have hearing loss that isn’t severe enough to warrant expensive prescription devices. In reality, many go for $1,500 to $2,000 . . . . The struggles come as Apple prepares to release a potential game-changer — a software update that will turn its popular, $249 AirPods Pro 2 into hearing aids."
This year's spooky season will be topped off by rarely-seen cosmic visitors. "In the days leading up to Halloween, Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, also known as Comet C/2023 A3, will be at its brightest, and likely visible to the naked eye. . . just look to the western sky shortly after sunset. As the days pass, the comet will get fainter and move to a higher part of the sky," reports James Wray for The Conversation. "The second comet, C/2024 S1 (ATLAS), should be visible around the end of October. The comet will pass closest to Earth on Oct. 24 – look low in the eastern sky just before sunrise. Then, after swinging around the Sun, the comet may reappear in the western night sky right around Halloween."
University of Virginia graph, from Census Bureau Annual Age Estimates
The population of some bigger U.S. cities is shrinking as younger residents move to smaller towns and cities even as Covid-era worries wither, reports Paul Davidson of USA Today. "Since the pandemic, cities with more than 1 million residents have lost adults ages 25 to 44 while towns with smaller populations have gained young people, after accounting for both those moving in and leaving, according to a University of Virginia analysis of Census Bureau data."
Hamilton Lombard, the study's author and a demographer at the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service, told Davidson, "Younger adults have driven most of the shift. . . since the pandemic. . . . The migration of younger adults into small towns and rural areas picked up last year rather than returning to pre-pandemic trends."
The age group's surprising shift in geography and lifestyle preferences has some experts scratching their heads. "The migration of young adults to small towns unexpectedly accelerated last year. From 2020 to 2023, young people comprised 54% of population gains in areas with fewer than 250,000 residents," Davidson reports. "Since 2020, areas with fewer than 1 million residents have added 25- to 34-year-olds in large numbers while more densely populated areas have lost them."
"Those in the 25 to 44 age bracket may not come back to large metro areas anytime soon," Davidson reports. Remote work options have "allowed more young Americans to live in smaller towns with more open spaces, natural beauty and low costs. . . . As large-city home prices and rents have soared, young people have flocked to smaller, more affordable markets."
Choosing not to move has become more popular. (Adobe Stock photo)
In a dramatic shift, many Americans have decided that relocating isn't as doable or desirable. "The share of Americans moving has reached its lowest point in history — and doesn't look like it's climbing back up anytime soon," reports Erica Pandey of Axios. "Moving — across town, across the state and across the country — for new jobs and better lives was once a common part of American life. Now, staying put longer is the norm."
Several trends are driving the move not to move. Among those key factors are younger people who are opting to live at home longer. Also, the increasing age of Americans makes a dent in would-be movers since older people are less likely to leave a place where they may have a support system, family and medical care.
In the 1960s, "around 1 in 5 Americans moved each year, according to the Brookings Institution," Pandey writes. "As of 2022, that’s fallen to 8.7% — even accounting for the pandemic-era moves out of big coastal cities and into places like the Sun Belt and sky-high housing prices are keeping people from moving into new homes or buying their first homes."
Those who are still on the move "are disproportionately college-educated. As the N.Y. Times notes, less-educated workers don't benefit as much from moving to a city as they once did in terms of higher wages," Pandey adds. "And while the recent increase in migration between states is notable, it follows a long-term decline over the past several decades."
This map shows where age 25-45 population has increased from 2020 to 2023. (Map by H. Lombard, from Census Bureau data)
As more younger people move into Virginia, communities that were once watching young people leave or avoid their regions are seeing population growth. "The net in-migration of younger adults has been significant enough that the median age has now fallen in 35 Virginia localities," reports Dwayne Yancey of Cardinal News. "Most of them are rural, and most of them are in Southwest and Southside."
A longitudinal review of U.S. Census data reveals who is moving in, and in this case, it's not retirees. "In much of rural Virginia, we’re seeing an increase in the number of young adults, part of what appears nationally to be a post-pandemic trend to move out of bigger cities," Yancey explains. Three years of data support this shift. "In 1980, there wasn’t much difference in the median ages among localities in Virginia. . . . By 2019, every locality had gotten older but. . .new data that shows since the 2020 census, some localities have gotten younger."
While the shift in numbers isn't huge, it's significant because the overall net shows a trend of younger people making rural Virginia home. Yancey reports, "Virtually every locality is seeing its 65 and older population grow. . . as the huge baby boom generation ages. . . [And] most places have seen their population of ages 25 to 45 grow. . . . working-age adults in the main years for getting married and having families. Overall, though, the state is gaining people in the 25-45 cohort; it’s just not gaining them in the biggest metros. Instead, they’re going to rural areas."
These communities are getting younger. (Map by H. Lombard, from Census Bureau data)
Rural Virginia is still aging and remains the oldest in the state; however, "The state's two biggest metro areas, Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads, are facing unprecedented demographic challenges that should concern all of us," Yancey adds. "Rural areas depend on our state's metro areas to generate the revenue that subsidizes rural schools, for instance. . . . Much of rural Virginia is now seeing a demographic renaissance." Danville and Martinsville, Virginia, were "given up for dead when textiles, tobacco and furniture collapsed," but have had surprising recoveries.
Stay Work Play NH's Policy and Pints series at Post and Beam Brewing. (The Daily Yonder photo)
Some states are using new ways to get younger people to return to or join rural communities and put down roots. "States like Kansas, Nebraska, and New Hampshire are working hard to attract and retain younger generations," reports Caroline Tremblay for The Daily Yonder. The goal of each state's plan is to get previous rural residents to return and to attract new residents. To entice both groups, planners and policymakers have created platforms for conversations where younger people's ideas and voices are valued and used by decision makers.
In rural Kansas, the Kansas Sampler Foundation implemented a "PowerUp" identifier for younger residents "between the ages of 21 and 39ish," Tremblay explains. "A PowerUp is someone who is rural by choice. . . . Many PowerUps KSF has interviewed express wanting a sense of community, especially when it comes to raising kids, and a number have voiced entrepreneurial aspirations."
Nebraska's approach to gaining younger residents is to invite those who left to come home and add their valued gifts to their hometown communities. State activist Megan Helberg "is one of many spreading the message that young Nebraskans should go explore but then bring their greatness back," Tremblay reports. "In 2024, Helberg's senior class had six graduates, all of whom are heading off to college. But 75% are committed to coming back to help with an existing business or start one of their own."
New Hampshire has its own twist on helping younger people look at the state's rural places in a new way called Stay Work Play. The non-profit hosted conversational sessions that took place across the state's colorful brewery scene where state policymakers and planners could hear what younger residents needed to enjoy and stay in New Hampshire. "Unsurprisingly, housing and childcare were high on the list," Tremblay writes. "Stay Work Play is supporting greater investments in the state’s workforce housing fund and advocating for the ability to build smaller units on smaller lot sizes."
U.S. farmers have their hands full amid increased production demands, climate change management and working to use fewer environmentally harmful practices. In response to those needs, a new agricultural strategy known as "climate-smart agriculture" has evolved; however, the concept lacks a prescribed model. In their article for the Prairie Research Institute, Olivia Messerges and Trent Ford "call for developing a consistent, widely applicable, and standardized framework to assess what makes a specific agricultural system or practice 'climate-smart' and analyzes agroforestry and prescribed grazing within said framework."
At this time, CSA is broadly defined with a three-pillar structure, which includes: increasing agricultural productivity, enhancing agricultural resilience and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Beyond those requirements, more specific guidance is needed. Messerges and Ford explain: "A standardized framework would also enable producers, policymakers and researchers to consistently compare the effectiveness, tradeoffs and implementation barriers of various CSA systems and practices. The framework will result in improved implementation of CSA goals, better policy development, and more informed decision-making processes on a national scale. . . . This article subsequently provides examples of such an assessment using examples of agroforestry and prescribed grazing systems, which are often referred to as 'climate-smart.'"
In its simplest terms, agroforestry means farming with trees, and its use is divided into four methods including silvopasture, riparian forest buffers, forest farming and alley cropping. Each implementation practice comes with a complex set of positives, negatives and "we don't know yet" results. "Alley cropping can support soil stabilization, bioremediation, and biodiversity, which are important for climate change adaptation and emission reduction," Messerges and Ford note. "However, root competition with grain or horticulture crops may hinder production benefits. Riparian forest buffers are effective at helping farmers to become more resilient. . . but productivity and emission benefits are not well-known."
Prescribed grazing is another farming practice considered "climate-smart," but once again without a structure the term and use of grazing as a method that delivers on the three pillars is hard to measure. "In the context of the three-pillar framework, the CSA benefits of prescribed grazing are less clear than for agroforestry," Messerges and Ford report. "While prescribed grazing offers many benefits, there is substantial uncertainty in its effectiveness in achieving CSA objectives."
To read Messerges and Ford's full report, sources and descriptive graphs, click here.
Addie
Comegys travels 45 minutes for her prenatal visits. (Photo by Tony Leys, KFF Health News)
As rural women have fewer babies, hospitals that once served more remote locations have closed their labor and delivery units, which leaves rural pregnant women facing maternity care deserts, reports Tony Leys of KFF Health News. In many areas, women leaving or not wanting to relocate to smaller towns with limited obstetric care has contributed to rural population loss.
Rural areas surrounding Oskaloosa, Iowa, population 11,558, illustrate how obstetric care has become long-distance care for some pregnant women. "At least 41 Iowa hospitals have shuttered their labor and delivery units since 2000," Leys writes. "Those facilities, representing about a third of Iowa hospitals, are located mostly in rural areas where birth numbers have plummeted."
Addie Comegys, who lives in southern Iowa and is expecting a baby in August, has spent part of her summer driving "45 minutes each way for prenatal checkups at Oskaloosa's hospital," Leys writes. "Oskaloosa's hospital has kept its labor and delivery unit open, partly by pulling in patients from 14 other counties." Not every smaller hospital has that geographical benefit.
For women who don't have reliable transportation or flexible work schedules, longer travel to see an obstetric provider becomes a barrier to care. Declining births have accelerated the problem. "Katy Kozhimannil, a University of Minnesota health policy professor who studies rural issues, said declining birth numbers and obstetric unit closures can create a vicious cycle," Leys reports. "Fewer babies being born in a region can lead a birthing unit to shutter. Then the loss of such a unit can discourage young people from moving to the area, driving birth numbers even lower."
Despite delivering far fewer babies, some rural hospitals have kept their units open, but that choice has posed care challenges. "A study published in JAMA in 2023 found that women were more likely to suffer serious complications if they gave birth in rural hospitals that handled 110 or fewer births a year," Leys writes. "The authors said they didn't support closing low-volume units because that could lead more women to have complications related to traveling for care. Instead, they recommended improving training and coordination among rural health providers."
When rural populations shrink, the quality of small-town life declines. (Adobe Stock photo)
Some rural populations have continued to shrink, leaving towns that were once vibrant places facing an uncertain future. "Across rural Pennsylvania, there is a deepening sense of fear about the future as population loss accelerates. The sharp decline has put the state at the forefront of a national discussion on the viability of the small towns that have long been a pillar of American culture," reports Tim Craig of The Washington Post. Many losses stem from a rural aging population not being replaced by births and younger families moving away in search of better opportunities.
Around 10 years ago, the U.S. rural population flattened and then began to contract. In fact, 81% of rural counties "had more deaths than births between 2019 and 2023," Craig writes. "Experts who study the phenomena say the shrinking baby boomer population and younger residents having smaller families and moving elsewhere for jobs are fueling the trend."
In the 1980s, parts of rural Pennsylvania began losing people because of "job losses in the manufacturing and energy industries that prompted many younger families to relocate to Sun Belt states," Craig reports. "State lawmakers and other leaders now consider the population loss a crisis and are drawing up plans to try to reverse the trend."
When a small town has more people die than are born, and fewer people move in to fill the gaps, daily life changes for the entire community. "Already, the demographic shift is affecting where students attend school, how long residents have to wait for an ambulance and whether they can quickly see a doctor," Craig explains. "In some cases, local governments themselves are on the verge of collapse as they struggle to fill open jobs and leadership positions."
Sheffield, Pennsylvania, is one community facing the reality of "too many old people." The area began to decline about "a decade ago. . . . But it’s been only in the last decade or so that the full weight of the community’s future challenges began," Craig reports. "Sheffield’s only ambulance was taken out of service about two years ago, around the same time the community’s only daycare closed due to low enrollment. . . Residents are peeved that the local bank branch and liquor store have closed."
The community may have to close its high school because there aren't enough students. Jim Decker, chairman of the Warren County Chamber of Business and Industry, wants "local leaders to figure out a way to reinvent the community," Craig adds. "But Decker acknowledged the planning for Warren County’s recovery is 'a daunting task.'"
Kenneth M. Johnson, a demographer at the University of New Hampshire, said, "Barring some outside occurrence, it’s very unusual for counties to recover."
FarmdocDaily graph, from 2023 UIUC Rural Vitality Survey
Many rural areas would like to see their populations grow, but housing shortages limit their capacity to attract and keep new residents. "In many communities, housing options are limited both in terms of affordability and type," reports Mark White for FarmdocDaily. "Given relatively slow population growth and an aging population, many Midwestern communities struggle to expand and/or update their housing stock."
University of Illinois researchers conducted studies on rural vitality, including resident surveys. They examined the housing limitations in rural Illinois communities and found "that many residents cannot find housing that meets their budget, needs, or standards," White writes. "Almost two-thirds of survey respondents believed that finding an affordable home within their region was difficult, particularly for renters, and almost 60% of survey respondents believed that their community lacked a variety of housing options. . . . It’s also important to note that these housing challenges are not
limited to just northern and central Illinois. Communities around the
Midwest and other parts of the country face similar challenges."
Too few homes are being built in the Midwest, and a lack of assisted care providers "suppresses turnover as many older residents stay in their homes longer than they would prefer," White reports. "In addition to shrinking and aging populations, other contributing factors have limited new home construction in farm dependent counties. . . . . For instance, the value of land for agriculture exceeds the value of land for housing development — particularly for housing that meets the needs of first-time homeowners or rental properties."
If rural counties and towns want to attract and keep a fresh workforce with new residents who move in and stay, housing shortages must be intentionally and collaboratively addressed. "Local communities might explore programs to address derelict or distressed properties. Such investments can limit the deterioration of the existing housing stock, which can also stabilize property values to benefit the local tax base," White explains. "Rural communities might also consider efforts to promote more diverse types of residential housing (e.g., multi-family, rental) that sometimes face opposition from existing residents and homeowners. Regardless, no one strategy — nor one local or regional actor — can solve community housing challenges."
Chart by The Economist magazine, adapted by The Rural Blog
The 2020 U.S. census was the first in which fewer people were counted in rural counties than in the previous census. "Over half of the country’s counties, home to a quarter of Americans, lost population," The Economistnotes. "Over the coming decades still more will, because America’s population is growing more slowly. The change will be wrenching, because of America’s demographic and administrative peculiarities." And that has special significance for rural areas.
Many other wealthy countries "are growing even more slowly or shrinking," The Economist notes. "America’s demographic problems are much smaller than those of its peers. Yet there are reasons to worry that America will adapt to slow growth even less readily than other countries. America’s population is growing at about the same rate as those of Britain and France. But America is different from Britain or France in that its population is much more prone to move around the country."
When many people leave a place, the magazine says, "It can set in motion reinforcing cycles that accelerate the decline. For example, when there is far more housing available than people to fill it, the result tends to be a collapse in the value of homes. If it is severe enough, landlords and even homeowners stop maintaining their properties, because the cost of repairs is higher than the return they will generate. As the resulting blight spreads and neighbourhoods begin to feel hollowed out, the incentive to stay is reduced even further. This is what is called a death spiral.
"Death spirals tend to be worse in America because of the remarkable level to which the government is decentralised. Just 8% of spending on primary and secondary education comes from the federal government, for example, and less than a quarter of the spending on law enforcement. Local and regional authorities levy 48% of all tax collected in America, compared with just 20% in France and 6% in Britain. And even America’s federal spending typically comes in the form of grants linked to population levels. So when local tax revenues shrink, services must be cut or taxes must rise."
The Economist asks and answers: "Does it matter if places die? Some would argue no. People are better off if they can move to opportunity, instead of becoming trapped in dying cities or jobless rural areas. Indeed, competition between cities helps explain America’s economic dynamism . . . Shrinking is hugely politically unpopular because, inevitably, many people are left behind, and the lives of those unwilling or unable to move worsen as their neighbors depart. Federal, state and local officials know this. And so they will do almost anything to avoid shrinking. All manner of big government facilities, from air-force bases to prisons, can be located in rural areas, ensuring there are jobs that in turn sustain the rest of the economy."
Looking ahead, The Economist says: "If America’s population does not grow faster, far more places will begin to die. The politics of that will be ugly. Of the counties that lost population in the decade to 2020, 90% voted for Donald Trump in 2020. Presumably, his fulminations about American decline resonate. Yet much of the recent slowdown in America’s population growth dates to Mr. Trump’s presidency when, even before the pandemic, net migration fell by a quarter as his administration deliberately gummed up the immigration services."
The Economist's report was centered on Cairo and Alexander County, Illinois, which had the greatest population decline (33 percent) of any county in the last decade. Here's the story's final paragraph: "Driving your correspondent around Cairo, Phillip Matthews, the chairman of the Democratic Party in Alexander County, lists services that have been cut over the years: public housing closed, government offices moved, schools shut down. He points out the public hospital in which he was born—now a derelict concrete hulk. 'A lot of this is done by design,' he declares, of his town’s decline. What he means is that politicians took many of the decisions that have contributed to the decay. Mr. Matthews is pinning his hopes on a stalled plan to spend $40 million on a new river port in Cairo, which has been backed by J.B. Pritzker, the state’s Democratic governor. If the port is ever built, perhaps Cairo will recover somewhat. But in the meantime, Mr. Matthews, a black pastor, says he understands why more and more people in his region support Mr. Trump. 'The Democratic Party is failing its constituents,' he says. 'People are scared to say it, but truth is truth.' The worse things get, the more votes Mr. Trump will win."
U.S. mortality rates can fall into two very different camps -- rural working-age death rates and everyone else's death rate. "Rural Americans age 25 to 54 — considered the prime working-age population — are dying of natural causes such as chronic diseases and cancer at wildly higher rates than their age-group peers in urban areas, according to a new report from the Agriculture Department's Economic Research Service," reports Jazmin Orozco Rodriguez of KFF Health News.
To compare the two groups, "USDA researchers analyzed mortality data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from two three-year periods — 1999 through 2001, and 2017 through 2019," Rodriguez explains. "In 1999, the natural-cause mortality rate for rural working-age adults was only 6 percent higher than that of their city-dwelling peers. By 2019, the gap had widened to 43 percent."
In reviewing demographic differences, Native American women fared the worst, but overall, a link between younger rural deaths and a lack of Medicaid expansion could be part of the cause. "USDA researchers and other experts noted that states in the South that have declined to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act had some of the highest natural-cause mortality rates for rural areas," Rodriguez reports. "But the researchers didn’t pinpoint the causes of the overall disparity."
Another possible connection could be the lack of rural health care options and rural hospital closures. "Alan Morgan, CEO of the National Rural Health Association, and other health experts have maintained for years that rural America needs more attention and investment in its health care systems by national leaders and lawmakers," Rodriguez adds. "It’s unlikely that things have improved for rural Americans since 2019, the last year in the periods the USDA researchers examined. The coronavirus pandemic was particularly devastating in rural parts of the country."
Louisiana had the highest rate of rural-population decline, 0.82%.
Driven by migration to rural areas near major cities, the population of America's rural counties grew in 2023, according to a Daily Yonder analysis of Census Bureau data. "The gain came primarily in counties that are closest to metropolitan areas and was the result of people moving to those counties from other parts of the country or internationally," Sarah Melotte reports.
"From 2022 to 2023, the number of people living in nonmetropolitan (rural) counties grew by 109,000 residents, a 0.24% increase. That’s slightly lower than the 150,000 residents that rural America gained from 2021 to 2022. These gains came after rural America lost nearly 300,000 residents in the 2010s. Meanwhile, metropolitan counties grew by 1.5 million residents from 2022 and 2023, a 0.53% increase in population."
Migration was key to rural population growth, because "rural counties recorded 610,000 deaths and 491,000 births . . . what demographers call natural decrease, which happens when the number of deaths is greater than the number of births." Almost all the rural population growth, 97 percent, occurred in counties that are adjacent to metropolitan areas. Overall, the growth in rural counties was small: 0.24%. Other types of areas gained much more, except the cores of major metros, which gained 0.14%.
The Appalachian Mountains in Georgia. (Photo by Jairph, Unsplash)
Once known for its rustic beauty, moonshine stills and impoverished residents, southern Appalachia's population is expanding as baby boomers from around the country relocate from more expensive regions. "The boomer migration to North Georgia, East Tennessee, the Carolinas and western Virginia is reshaping housing prices, traffic patterns, restaurant options and how local governments cope with something they haven't had to handle before: explosive growth," reports Cameron McWhirter of The Wall Street Journal. "Each year since 2020, an average of 328,000 people from other parts of the U.S. moved to the five-state region, according to Hamilton Lombard, a demographer at the University of Virginia.
Dawson County, Georgia, is the region's leader in population growth, which "saw a 12.5% increase from 2020 to 2022, reaching just over 30,000, according to estimates by the Census Bureau. . . . In Dawson, the population aged 65 or older reached 21% of the county in 2022, up from 14.1% in 2010. Many moving to the region are wealthier," McWhirter writes. "Dawson's home prices rose 46% compared with 39% nationally, according to Lombard's analysis of Zillow housing prices. Other Appalachian areas like Dawson saw similar spikes, the analysis showed."
In Dawson County, not everyone agrees on how to manage regional growing pains. McWhirter reports, "When Billy Thurmond was a boy, most roads here were made of dirt. Now 64, Thurmond, chairman of the Dawson CountyBoard of Commissioners, said he is regularly stopped at the local Walmart and asked about development and traffic issues. There's a twist: Many of those complaining are people who moved to the county in recent years."
Northern Georgia isn't alone in facing conflicts stemming from exponential growth. McWhirter explains, "From April 2020 to July 2022, the population in counties in southern Appalachia designated retirement or recreational areas grew by 3.8% — more than six times the national average, according to Lombard." Expanding towns face constant change as their governments, medical and emergency services, and recreational and retail offerings work to accommodate newcomers. "The influx of wealthier, older Americans has created challenges for governments working to expand services, including broadband, water and wastewater services, roads, health services and housing."
To explore the southern Appalachian population growth graphed by the numbers or to learn why these baby boomers are known as "halfbacks," click here.
As the construction industry struggles to meet the demand for new housing, it faces big obstacles, including a shortage of trained labor. Robbie Sequeira of Statelinereports, "The U.S. construction industry lost nearly 30% of its workforce during the Great Recession of 2008 and had barely recovered before the Covid-19 pandemic hit it again, as outlined by a study shared last spring by economists at the University of Utah and the University of Wisconsin. . . . However, the authors attributed much of the shortage to the federal Secure Communities immigration crackdown of the Obama administration."
An estimated 7 million more homes are needed, so the industry must find more trained workers to meet demand. "Employment isn't growing fast enough, said Erika Walter, director of media relations for Associated Builders and Contractors, a national industry group," Sequiera writes. "An analysis released earlier this month by the group found that at the end of November, there were about 459,000 job openings in the industry. The 5.4% job opening rate was the highest since 2000."
To attract new labor, the industry needs to address its hiring practices. Sequeira reports, "According to a 2022 Department of Laborreport, many apprentice programs for construction and trade-based skills often have sponsors who do not recruit or hire individuals from underrepresented groups — and may not even be aware of how to recruit members of those groups."
If recruitment and training shortages aren't managed, the shortage will intensify as aging workers retire. Sequiera notes, "More than 1 in 5 construction workers are 55 and older, and much of the workforce will be retiring in the coming decade, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics." Karl Eckhart, vice president of intergovernmental affairs for the National Association of Home Builders, told Sequiera, "We need to expedite the [recruitment and training] process so we can at least get shovels under the ground."
Several states are intervening to assist in training a new construction workforce, including Montana, New York, Ohio and Maryland. "Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine announced that 35 Ohio high school programs would receive almost $200 million in grant money to expand training facilities in areas including the electrical trades, welding and carpentry," Sequiera reports.
In a little over a decade, America won't be a beacon of youth and strappy upstarts. It will be old. "By 2034, there will be more Americans over the age of 65 than children. . . . It's time to prepare," advises The New York Times editorial board in its opinion piece, "Can America age gracefully?"
"Thanks to falling birthrates, longer life expectancy and the graying of the baby boomer cohort, our society is being transformed. This is a demographic change that will affect every part of society. Already, in about half the country, more people are dying than being born, even as more Americans live into their 80s, 90s and beyond. In 2020, the share of people 65 or older reached 17 percent, according to the Census Bureau. By 2034, there will be more Americans past retirement age than children.
"The challenge the country faces transcends ideology, geography and ethnic or racial category, and American leaders, regardless of their party, need to confront it with the appropriate urgency. . . . Places like Japan, with the highest proportion of people 65 or older in the world, offer a hint of what the near future might look like for America. In Japan, especially in rural areas, schools shut their doors because there are no longer enough children to fill them; births fell below 800,000 in 2022, and about 450 schools close every year. With fewer young people working, revenue for retirement programs is shrinking, and there is a chronic labor shortage. Japanese people increasingly work into their 60s, 70s and beyond, often in physically demanding but low-paid jobs such as making deliveries and cleaning offices."
A country with a significant aged population has particular needs, but American politicians and policy writers need to be faster to address the shift. The Board writes, "The strains are showing in everything from health care and housing to employment and transportation. With an average of 10,000 boomers turning 65 each day, these pressures are steadily intensifying and will continue to do so, especially if current immigration policies hold. . . . By 2053, more than 40 percent of the federal budget will go toward programs for seniors, primarily Social Security and Medicare . . . .
"A demographic shift this significant calls for a broad-based response, and the longer the challenges go unaddressed, the more formidable they become. . . . There are many pieces to this puzzle, including who will care for older people, where they will live, how our cities are designed and how businesses will adapt. Many older people in the United States say they feel invisible in a country that has long been obsessed with youth, avoiding the inevitability—and possibilities—of old age."
Grand Mound Hometown Pride Committee member Sarah Beuthien. (Photo by Savannah Blake, The Gazette)
As many rural towns in Iowa face decreasing populations, some opt to use "shrink smart" planning to improve citizens' quality of life while maintaining services, reports Tom Baron of The Gazette in Cedar Rapid, Iowa. The approach began as a project. "Iowa State's rural smart shrinkage project received a three-year, $1.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation to build upon a 2017 pilot study examining whether there were towns in Iowa that have lost population but perception of quality of life has remained stable or improved."
The project focused on "learning from six rural Iowa towns (Elma, Sac City, Bancroft, Corning, Mt. Ayr and Everly) where active, dedicated residents — called 'local champions' — are collaborating to maintain and boost quality of life" Barton writes. "The team found that, among other factors, social infrastructure plays a major role in whether residents report greater quality of life." Kimberly Zarecor, a professor of architecture who is leading an Iowa State University research project, advised towns to expend resources on community building vs. trying to "lure more families and employers to sparsely populated rural areas." Studied communities who adopted the shrink smart approach built on "quality-of-life initiatives-- such as trails, community events, fitness options and child care — [that] are typically low-cost and in local control, Zarecor said."
David Peters, a rural sociologist with ISU Extension and coordinator of the Iowa Small Towns Project, used Grand Mound, "a town of a little more than 600 people in Clinton County near the eastern edge of the state," as an example, Barton reports. "Grand Mound has experienced setbacks. The local school closed along with the local grocery store, restaurants and bars. Yet, the town has managed to maintain a relatively high quality of life, Peters said. Grand Mound has seen slower population loss than other small towns in the state but has higher social capital. Residents surveyed. . . . said they felt much more involved in decisions and feel the town is supportive and trusting of new projects and ideas. Peter told Barton, "In short, (Grand Mound) is a moderately shrinking place with a high and growing quality of life."
Chart by Sarah Melotte, The Daily Yonder, from IRS data
In 2021, the pandemic changed more than life expectancy in the U.S., it also altered where people chose to live, with more than 325,000 Americans moving from metropolitan areas to rural counties, reports Sarah Melotte of The Daily Yonder.
The South, which is the major region with the most rural population, “also had more in-migration to rural counties than other regions on a per capita basis,” Melotte reports. “Out of all the people who moved from larger cities to rural areas in 2021, two-thirds wound up living in the rural South, a Daily Yonder analysis of IRS data shows.” Southern rural counties gained 65% of the number of people who moved from metropolitan to nonmetropolitan counties in 2021. The Midwest came in second place at 25% for regions with rural in-migrant gains.
“Our analysis revealed that most urban expats in 2021 came from neighboring metros in the same state,” Melotte explains. “The pie chart shows that an overwhelming majority (98%) of people who contributed to rural growth in the Southern U.S. came from cities and suburbs within the South.” People from Mid-Atlantic counties represented a tiny fraction of movers at 1%, and less than a percent came from the Southwest.
Chart by Sarah Melotte, The Daily Yonder, from IRS data
Despite 200,500 people moving into Southern rural counties, the gains determined by IRS data don’t include the number of deaths and births. Melotte reports, “For example, 379 people moved to rural Rabun County, Georgia, in 2021, but the county’s total population change that year only added up to 174 people, according to Census estimates. That’s because some residents moved out, and others died that year." When out-migration and deaths were considered, the net gain in rural population in the South was about 20,500 residents, representing a 0.12% increase from the previous year.
Pageland's motto is "The Watermelon Capital of the World." (Photo by David Yeazell, The Post and Courier)
It's not easy staying a quaint town when lots of people want to move in. "Pageland, a town of 2,500 people on the South Carolina-North Carolina state line, is changing. As the Charlotte metro area spills over the border, the community has become inundated with people looking for more affordable, convenient housing," reports Seth Taylor Staylor of The Post and Courier in Charleston, S.C. "Pageland's population will double by the end of the decade if development continues at the current pace."
That kind of growth provides smaller towns like Pageland economic opportunities, but can also change what was once a close-knit town into something much different. Pageland residents "worry about overcrowded schools, inadequate infrastructure, emergency services stretched thin and the rising cost of living. They worry that the town’s identity will be lost," Staylor reports. Tim Griffin, the town's Chamber of Commerce president, is worrying the town is losing its battle to hold onto its small-town vibe. He told Staylor: “We’ve got to manage our growth. And we’ve got to be very proud of who we are, so people want to be a part of that. . . . It’s scary because what’s coming is unknown to us.”
BestPlaces.net map, adapted
Some longtime residents say the change "isn't necessarily a bad change, but it's a noticeable one," Staylor reports. Robin Usher, a third-generation resident of Pageland, told Staylor, “In the community, just going to the grocery store and not knowing people is new because, for so long, we knew everybody at the grocery store when we shopped. We don’t know everyone now.” Staylor adds, "Officials said Pageland’s growth is largely driven by the housing market in Charlotte — an hour away — bursting at the seams."
Staylor reports, "For much of Pageland’s 115-year history, it’s been isolated by limited economic opportunities and its distance from other cities, Adam Foard, a Pageland attorney who has spent his life in the town said. . . . Now, Pageland’s destiny is very much out of its own hands. What’s more, many of the people moving to Pageland see it as a springboard to urban life in Charlotte rather than a place with a rural lifestyle all its own." Foard told Staylor: "It was not (that) people discovered Pageland and decided that Pageland was a nirvana seven miles across the state line. . . Pageland became acceptable when they could no longer get what they needed over the state line.”
As local services and government struggle to keep up, "Pageland officials voted to approve a substantial impact fee this spring . . . to pay for the numerous enhancements the city will need to keep up with growth," Staylor reports. "The cost to different developments depends on the type of building and the resources it will consume, according to an impact fee study produced for the town. A typical single-family home will be expected to pay more than $8,000 when the building permit is issued and almost $3,000 when the house connects to water and sewer." Shane Sligh, the town administrator, told Staylor, "At the end of the day, we’ve got to be able to provide new residences with the same services that we’re providing."
Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies map, adapted by The Rural Blog
Joint Center for Housing Studies table, from Census Bureau data; click on it to enlarge
One of the most significant changes wrought by the pandemic was expansion of remote work, which allowed many people to move to states with lower costs of living. "The U.S. housing map is being redrawn as work-from-home makes renters and home buyers more mobile and more likely to choose a place to live based on factors such as weather and tax rates," reports Meg Cunningham for Investopedia. They are "increasingly relocating to less-expensive areas, according to a report from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University, leading to increased demand for housing in lower-cost areas."
Expensive, often coastal, urban areas have seen the largest declines as remote workers prioritized moving places with cheaper overall living costs. "While the trend was especially popular [to move to] the suburbs across the country, rural areas also had an increase in demand. At 57%, more than half of all rural counties recorded more people moving in than out last year, according to the Harvard report," Cunningham writes. "The South had the largest net inflows of any U.S. region last year, with the biggest gains in Texas, Florida, and North Carolina. . . . Montana and Wyoming also experienced a similar influx, according to the Harvard report. . . . The Sun Belt has remained popular for those looking to leave big city life, with states such as Florida, Arizona, and Texas seeing massive influxes."
Domestic migration has become "the largest source of population growth in 20 states and the largest source of population decline in 23 states," Cunningham reports. "Because of their tendency to prioritize remote work and more flexibility, younger Americans are leading the way when it comes to domestic migration trends across the country. . . . . And migration shows no signs of slowing down. . . . . A record 25.2% of Redfin users nationwide are looking to relocate, up from 22.8% last year, according to a report from earlier this year. Many buyers are looking to leave their hometowns or move to more affordable areas. . . . Five of the top 10 destinations are in Florida, and nearly all of them are in the Sun Belt. Florida was the fastest-growing state in 2022, with warm weather, affordability, and low taxes enticing those from out-of-state."
