Report: Food and agriculture sector will contribute $10.4 trillion to U.S. economy in 2026

The U.S. food and agriculture industries will produce $10.4 trillion for the economy in 2026, backing 48.7 million jobs, reports Feed & Grain staff.

Despite rising inflation and global trade pressures, the sector makes up almost 20% of the national economy, increasing profits by $894 billion each year, according to data from the Feeding the Economy report.

Food manufacturing is the largest manufacturing sector in the country, from two million farms and ranches to 200,000 food manufacturing, processing and storage facilities. It also includes more than one million restaurants and foodservice establishments, and 200,000 retail food stores.

The economic impact of the food and agriculture sector in each state. (Interactive map via Feeding the Economy, Click here to choose your state.)

Some of the highlights from the report show the food and agriculture sector generating:

• More than $177.3 billion worth of exports
• More than $3 trillion in workers' wages
• 6.5% growth in direct employment over the last decade
• 4% yearly rise in wages and 13% rise over the last decade, surpassing inflation
• $1.35 trillion in tax revenue for federal, state and local governments, increasing 7% each year

Many rural communities rely on food and agriculture revenue as the backbone of their local economy, with wages reinvested to support local housing, healthcare, education, small businesses and infrastructure, reports Feeding the Economy. “From farm to factory and truck to table, food and agriculture's impact sustains jobs, powers commerce, and strengthens communities across America."

American consumers are worried about their energy bills, the job market and the increased cost of groceries

Americans deploy different strategies to counter grocery
costs. (Adobe Stock photo)

Between spiking energy bills and a dreary jobs market, a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs documents the deep stress many Americans feel about their bills and future financial prospects, reports Olivier Knox of U.S. News and World Report. Along with those worries, American consumers continue to look for ways to counter the ever-increasing cost of groceries.

When asked about utility bills, 36% of poll respondents said their "electricity bills are a 'major' source of stress, and a bit more than one half – 54% – said the same about grocery costs, a little more than a year ahead of the November 2026 midterm," Knox writes.

Roughly 47% of polled adults said they were "'not very' or 'not at all confident' they could find a good job if they wanted to," Knox reports. This response marks a big increase from 37% the last time the question was asked in October 2023.

Polled responses were somewhat surprising given the U.S. economy's low unemployment numbers and healthy stock market gains. Knox adds, "But there are worrying signs, including a weakening labor market."

While many Americans express concern about the overall cost of living, most continue to battle ongoing grocery price increases, reports Christopher Kuo of The Wall Street Journal. According to the Labor Department data, since August 2024, the price of "coffee increased 20.9%, ground beef was up 12.8%, and bananas rose 6.6%. Dairy, fruits, vegetables and cereals have all become pricier."

In an effort to help stretch their food budgets, some consumers are "cutting back on purchases, stockpiling certain foods or exploring more-affordable stores," Kuo adds. Other shoppers have become choosier about what lands in their cart, while others scour sale-only items.

U.S. food costs are rising due to higher commodity prices for items like beef, along with market adjustments to tariffs. Kuo explains, "Some of these costs have been absorbed by food companies; others are being passed on to consumers."

Some residents in rural Mason, Tenn., don't want a migrant detention center in their town, but it's coming anyway

At times, the town meeting devolved into the mayor, left,
shouting at citizens. (YouTube, WREG, Memphis, Tenn.)

Despite raucous pushback from residents and activists during a recent town meeting in Mason, Tenn., the evening ended with the mayor and council members approving agreements to transition the town's closed prison into a migrant detention facility managed by a private company.

"The first vote of the meeting resulted in approval for a contract with CoreCivic to resume operating the facility, which was closed in 2021," Adrian Sainz of The Associated Press reports.  "The second vote was to approve an agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement."

Eddie Noeman, Mason's mayor, who emigrated from Egypt, saw reopening the facility as a way to boost the town's lagging economy. "Noeman said he wanted to bring jobs and economic development to the town," Sainz explains. "With a population of about 1,300, Mason is located about 40 miles northeast of Memphis. When it was open, the prison was the town’s largest employer."

Before the start of the contentious meeting, Mason board member Virginia Rivers said she was not in favor of the town being connected to an ICE facility. She told Sainz, "I don’t like what ICE stands for, how they treat the people.” 

Once the contracts were approved, CoreCivic released a statement touting all the benefits the center will contribute to the town, such as good-paying jobs and tax generation.

Overall, CoreCivic has a darker reputation in Tennessee. Sainz reports, "The company has spent more than $4.4 million to settle about 80 lawsuits and out-of-court complaints alleging mistreatment — including at least 22 inmate deaths — at four Tennessee prisons and two jails from 2016 through September 2024."

AI isn't coming for 'blue-collar' jobs. The skilled trades sector boasts 'high-tech, 21st-century, rewarding, well-paying jobs.'

Human work may change as AI enters
new markets. (Unsplash graphic)

Artificial intelligence may upend parts of the U.S. labor market, but "blue-collar" jobs are growing and expected to be less vulnerable to AI intrusion. "AI is supposed to displace millions of workers in the coming years — but when your toilet won't flush at 2 a.m., you're not going to call ChatGPT," reports Ben Berkowitz of Axios. "Companies are already boasting of saving hundreds of millions of dollars a year by using AI instead of humans."

AI might be able to regurgitate its "white-collar work" programming with razor-like precision, but putting on a new roof or installing electrical wiring won't be its domain. "The 40 most-vulnerable jobs (translators, historians, sales reps, etc.), basically all of them office work," Berkowitz writes. "The 40 least-vulnerable jobs (dredge operators, roofers, etc.), just about all of them manual labor."

Reinvigorating American labor and manufacturing has "become a key Trump administration economic talking point: Blue-collar wages are rising faster now than at the start of any other administration going back to Nixon," Berkowitz reports.

Even before the AI mega-data center expansions, there was a skilled trade worker shortage. "AI will, ironically, only make [the shortage] worse," Berkowitz explains. "Factories alone are short about 450,000 people a month, per the National Association of Manufacturers."

Jay Timmons, the CEO of NAM, told Berkowitz, "We're really talking about high-tech, 21st-century, rewarding, well-paying jobs. Manufacturers are really embracing what's coming, and they accept the responsibility."

Efforts to ramp up the number of American trade workers "will require a large-scale, national effort — not just for up-and-coming students, but for mid-career folks forced into a pivot," Berkowitz explains. "Everyone from politicians to CEOs recognizes just how badly they need tradespeople to keep the economy running." 

Skilled labor started recruiting from high school shop classes; high school graduates can make over $60,000

Skilled trades can offer training during high school
and a good-paying job upon graduation. (Adobe Stock photo)

Skilled labor training is helping some high schoolers land jobs with big pay before they even graduate. "Companies with shortages of skilled workers look to shop class to recruit future hires," reports Te-Ping Chen of The Wall Street Journal. "Elijah Rios won’t graduate from high school until next year, but he already has a job offer — one that pays $68,000 a year."

While the U.S. shortage of skilled labor has been building over time, baby boomer retirements have pushed trade-based companies that need a pipeline of trained professionals to "turn to creative recruiting strategies," Te-Ping explains. "More businesses are teaming up with high schools to enable students to work part-time, earning money as well as academic credit. More employers are showing up at high school career days." The renewed interest in hiring from the trades has helped revive high school shop programming.

Younger workers generally are more at ease with incorporating technology into their work, which is another reason trade recruiters are stepping up their "shop class" connections. According to the WSJ article, "Employers say that as the skilled trades become more tech-infused, they anticipate doing even more recruitment at an early age, because they need workers who are comfortable programming and running computer diagnostics."

One of the best things employers can do to "get a foot into high schools early on is by offering internships, says Roxanne Amiot, an automotive instructor at Bullard-Havens Technical School in Bridgeport, Conn.," Te-Ping writes. She told the Journal, “I tell them, don’t call me for students when they graduate, grab them now when they’re 16 or 17, or I have nobody to work for you.”

The recruitment opportunities and wages that trade professions offer signal a dramatic shift away from the "college-for-all mindset," according to the article. "[But] it’s important to make sure students are made aware of all their options, says Steve Klein, a researcher who focuses on vocational education. . . . At the same time, as interest in vocational education rises, he worries that sentiment runs the risk of swinging too much in the other direction."

Federal firefighters have 'grueling' jobs for paltry pay; grassroots organizing works to change pay and benefits

Wildland firefighters are considered a 'national resource,'
but many are risking their lives for $15 an hour. (A.S. photo)

Federal firefighters can spend weeks away from home putting out devastating fires while barely making enough money to make ends meet. The mismatch between job demands and pay has caused some firefighters to leave the profession, but other firefighters have organized to change pay and benefits, reports Nathan Pipenberg of Capital and Main. Grassroots Wildland Firefighters "represents a striking example of a growing movement among workers to organize outside the structure of an existing union."

While some new unions start without a broader union's umbrella, GWF is using its members' support to work in tandem with the profession's existing union, the National Federation of Federal Employees, to give the profession a stronger voice. "Firefighters increasingly felt they needed to make themselves heard if they wanted to see change. So far, Grassroots Wildland Firefighters — working alongside NFFE — has proven that point." Max Alonzo, a former firefighter hired by NFFE who helps with legislative plans, told Pipenberg, "I don’t feel like we’d be as far as we are right now if they hadn’t brought national attention to these issues.”

The dual effort is gaining momentum. "When Congress began considering a pay supplement for federal firefighters, whose starting wage is the federal worker minimum of $15 an hour, both the union and Grassroots Wildland Firefighters organized front-line workers to meet with members of Congress and speak at committee hearings and a press conference on the steps of the Capitol," Pipenberg explains. "With pressure came promising results: temporary pay supplements, expiring this September, that currently translate to as much as $20,000 per year. Although it was not the permanent legislation they sought, firefighters saw their starting annual income nearly double, to $51,500."

Even with pay increases, a national discussion about the physical and health risks federal wildland workers endure remains elusive. "The job can be grueling and unusually demanding. Wildland workers are expected to serve as a 'national resource,' available to travel across the country with only a few hour's notice," Pipenberg reports. "Firefighters fell trees, dig fire breaks, and crawl on hands and knees to find hotspots that could ignite. They often sleep outdoors, near the fire and in the smoke."

September will mark the end of the temporary pay supplements, which means the GWF and NFFE continue to lobby. "The groups are pushing for the Wildland Firefighter Paycheck Protection Act, which would make the supplement permanent, and for Tim’s Act, which would raise wages, expand mental health service and offer health insurance to seasonal workers," Pipenberg writes. "Both bills have been introduced in Congress but have made little progress."

Florida lawmakers work to ban local governments from implementing temperature protections for outdoor workers

Summer temps in Florida are regularly in the 90s.
(Photo by Xavier Coiffic, Unsplash)

Some Florida lawmakers are working to pass a bill that removes temperature protection regulations for employees. That same bill also would ban local "living wage" ordinances, which create higher minimum wage standards than the state requirement. "A measure that will ban local governments from passing heat-protection ordinances inspired strong emotions from the public . . . ," reports Mitch Perry for the Florida Phoenix. "The bill also eliminates living wage ordinances that require companies that receive government contracts to pay their employees more than the state's minimum wage (currently $12 an hour)."

This past fall, the Miami-Dade County Commission had planned a vote on a local ordinance that "would protect outdoor workers in the agriculture and construction industries, which, if passed, would be the first law of its kind in the South," Perry adds. "That proposal was introduced after at least two farmworkers died from excessive heat in South Florida earlier last year."

The Florida chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors pushed back against the local heat protection ordinance, saying regulation "inconsistencies" could cause more accidents. Meanwhile, local businesses "lined up behind the provision that would prohibit cities and counties from creating 'livable wage' ordinances for their contractors and subcontractors," Perry explains. "[These] ordinances are now in effect in 11 local governments in the state to combat higher living costs."

North Miami-Dade County Democratic Rep. Dotie Joseph "blasted the proposal, saying that her GOP colleagues were being negligent in taking away Miami-Dade's or any other local government's ability to protect outdoor workers," Perry reports. Joseph told reporters, "When local governments try to do something about it so that it doesn't happen again, here we show up at the state level and say, 'no, we don't mind a couple of more people dying.' That's basically what we're saying, functionally. So we're okay with workers dying."

The pay gap between rural and urban workers is getting worse, according to new financial data

City workers make about 23% more than rural workers.
(Campaign creators photo, Unsplash)

Workers in urban areas traditionally have made more money than rural workers, but the pay gap is getting worse, reports Elizabeth Trovall for Marketplace.

“In cities, people earn about 23% more than people in rural areas, according to new data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York,” Trovall reports. “That difference was more like 20% before the pandemic.”

The pay gap hasn’t always been so pronounced. According to Trovall’s report, “Rural areas were catching up to city wages, mostly because of new technology coming to smaller communities. ‘Then, around 1980, this all changed,'’’ said Conor Walsh of the Columbia Business School.

The loss of manufacturing jobs hurt rural incomes.

(Pitti.edu photo, Unsplash)

“That’s when the lucrative business services sector took off in places like New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco,” Trovall reports. “’In particular, finance, tech and professional services,’ Walsh said. . . . “At the same time, manufacturing jobs started leaving rural America, which helped to widen the gap.”

In addition, there's the long-standing difficulty of getting college-educated students from rural areas to return home after graduation instead of taking higher-paying jobs in larger cities.

The Covid-19 pandemic and high inflation have made the problems with income gaps worse in recent years.

"'Inflation impacted people living in rural areas more because they spent considerably more on goods with higher price increases,'" economist Selcuk Eren of The Conference Board told Trovall. "'What goods am I talking about? I'm talking about vehicle purchases, and I'm talking about gasoline."

Upset over unexpected wage cuts, some rural postal carriers want to decertify their union

Many rural carrier took an unexpected cut in pay.
(Photo by Victória Kubiaki, Unsplash)

Vexed with substantial pay decreases since May, many rural mail carriers are frustrated with their union, with some carriers pushing for de-unionization from the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association, reports Jarod Facundo of The American Prospect. "The U.S. Postal Service adopted a new payment system known as the Rural Route Evaluated Compensation System, reducing base pay for almost two-thirds of rural letter carriers. . . . Angered by what they view as the NRLCA's inability to protect their interests, a growing number of rural letter carriers inside the union are running a signature collection campaign to decertify the NRLCA's status. . . . They call themselves 'Decertify NRLCA.'"

Part of the frustration is what carriers were told the new system would mean versus what actually happened. Jamie King, a rural letter carrier from Florida, told Facundo, "I took a $15,000 pay cut overnight. King described how the NRLCA made initial predictions of. . . .route changes that downplayed the true total number of hours that would be cut for most rural letter carriers. . . ." and that "the implementation was worse than what they were led to believe."

The new pay system was negotiated through binding arbitration, which means decertification "faces legal challenges and unclear hopes about what would come next," Facundo reports. "But it is an expression of discontent with the union leadership's handling of the pay cuts, which has led some to question the value of the organization."

The NRLCA's leadership has "seized upon the legal ambiguity of whether decertification is feasible. In a late-August Facebook post, the NRLCA told its membership: … We take any and all attacks against this union seriously, and we will not sit idly by to see what happens,'" Facundo reports. "The NRLCA's countereffort has appeared to quell the Decertify movement's momentum. According to King, the most frustrating aspect has been how the NRLCA has responded to decertification threats." He told Facundo: "Instead of addressing our concerns and offering empathy and a solution, [the NRLCA is] only telling members what they will lose if they decertify the union. They have offered no solutions and instead lie and downplay the matter."

The loss of timber jobs left this county awash in poverty, violence and tree poaching

The Guardian illustration

Illegal tree harvesting is not ordinary in some parts, but it can become a person's primary source of income in lands where national parks and environmental concerns have ebbed out timbering employment. "Timber poaching exists at a confluence of this rural economic decline and environmental policy," reports Lyndsie Bourgon of The Guardian. "A number of poachers in Orick, California, detailed their motivations as an alchemy of poverty, lack of opportunity, drug misuse and resentment toward national parks, the federal government and environmentalists. . . . It's a snapshot of how rural communities across North America face de-industrialization, the ways they have failed to transition away from those dependent economies, and the people who remain rooted through the change."

Bourgon writes about Danny Garcia, a man who grew up in Orick, a Humbolt County town along California's Redwood Coast. Garcia was born into a beleaguered rural economy and became a tree poacher. Bourgon writes, "Redwoods National Park was instituted in the 1960s, then expanded in the 1970s, and in the late 20th century, the town was not spared from the Pacific north-west's timber wars. Orick's logging industry began to shrink, then all but disappeared as mills and lumber companies closed or moved." 

Alongside life in rural Orick, Garcia lived with the violence and trauma that often accompanies poverty. "By the early 1990s, Garcia's mother had died by suicide. His grandfather and many of his uncles were killed in logging accidents, traffic accidents and by drowning. Some spent time in prison; some used hard drugs. One of his aunts told me about the assaults she and her friends had experienced in the town from husbands, boyfriends, and other family members."

The sociologist Jennifer Sherman, a professor at Washington State University, studies unemployment's effects on rural communities in California and Washington. She told Bourgon, "Domestic violence is a huge part of my work. It seems to accompany poverty wherever poverty goes." Bourgon reports: "Humboldt leads California in violence against women; in particular, Indigenous women (close to 50% of Indigenous women in Humboldt are victims of domestic violence, according to Humboldt county domestic violence services). . . . Humboldt County averages 50% more domestic violence-related police calls per capita than the rest of California, and of those, close to half include a weapon."

Rural homelessness increased over the past two years; addressing the causes takes regional understanding

An emergency tent shelter in Arcata, a town in Northern California, helped unsheltered people get medical and other services early in the pandemic. (Photo from Arcata House Partnership via The Daily Yonder)

Inflation, transportation and affordable housing are troublesome for many Americans right now, and these stresses have a deeper impact on rural residents. "The number of people overall experiencing homelessness in the U.S. rose by less than 1% from 2020 to 2022," reports Kristi Eaton of The Daily Yonder. "But those in rural continuums of care, local planning bodies responsible for coordinating the full range of homelessness services in a geographic area, which may cover a city, county, metropolitan area, or an entire state, saw an increase of nearly 6%, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. . . . Causes of the increase include housing stock shortage, lower wages, and lack of public transit."

Reasons for rural homelessness are regional. “Every community is different. The housing markets are different, the access to health care and behavioral-health services are different. Wages as compared to housing are different," Jeff Olivet, executive director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, told Eaton. "So it’s likely that if you go to one rural part of the country, there might be one story to tell about the loss of economic opportunity and jobs to pay a livable wage. In another area, maybe there’s a dramatic increase in the cost of housing."

Because rural homelessness is multifaceted, it requires different safety nets. Eaton writes, "Steve Berg, chief policy officer at the National Alliance to End Homelessness, said rural homelessness is distinct from homelessness in other regions, and it’s imperative to have systems in place to respond to those unique needs." Berg told Eaton, "For example, outreach providers often have to canvas much larger geographic territories, and people will sometimes live in more remote areas where it is more difficult to identify and serve them . . . . It’s also important to know that wages tend to be lower in rural areas and the total inventory of housing also tends to be limited. Even in a region with lower rental prices, this creates enormous strain on people’s abilities to stay in their homes.”

Eaton reports, "Olivet also said transportation barriers can also be a factor in rural areas. He said he’s worked in areas like western Massachusetts or rural Pennsylvania, places that people don’t always think of when they think of vast rural areas like Appalachia or in the West." Olivet told Eaton, "But even in those kind of smaller geographies in the northeast, a transportation barrier of 10 miles, 20 miles to get from a place that’s affordable to live to a job that pays a living wage, if you don’t have a vehicle, there’s just not the public transportation infrastructure, or any way to get there. And so even a 10 or 20 mile distance can be a huge barrier. That could mean the difference between a job and no job for somebody.”

Walmart raising minimum hourly wage to $14 from $12; its pay scale influences those of many other rural employers

A Walmart checkout line (Photo from Walmart)

Walmart, which is the nation's largest employer and has a huge rural footprint, is raising wages for hourly workers in stores and warehouses. Starting pay next month will be at least $14 an hour, up from $12, the company said in a memo to staff Tuesday. 

"The company’s move could lead to wage pressure in lower-income areas where it is one of the main employers," Sarah Nassauer and Gabriel T. Rubin write for The Wall Street Journal. "Some economists have found that Walmart’s market power is a primary determinant of wage levels in local economies where they have a large presence, especially at other retailers and grocery stores."

Noting the company's more rural and Southeastern base, the Journal says "That means more of its 4,600 stores and warehouses are in states such as Texas, Mississippi and Georgia that haven’t adopted higher minimum wages in recent years. Twenty states don’t have a minimum wage higher than the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour, "which was last raised in 2009," the Journal notes. "More than half the states in the U.S. are set to lift their minimum wages in the coming year, although due to the tight labor market, employers have in many cases needed to offer pay significantly higher than the legal minimum in order to attract and retain employees."

Walmart's starting-pay hike is "the latest in a series of increases by the company to close the gap with rivals," the Journal reports. It "will push the company’s average hourly wages to over $17.50. Currently hourly workers at Walmart earn an average of around $17, a spokeswoman said." But its minimum will still be below the $15 minimum at its major rivals, Target and Amazon, which have a $15-an-hour minimum wage, and Costco's minimum is even higher, the Journal reports.

Justice Department probes whether chicken processors shared plant-worker pay data in order to keep wages low

"The Justice Department is investigating whether poultry companies have engaged in anticompetitive sharing about employment practices that held down plant workers’ wages, according to people familiar with the matter," Patrick Thomas and Brent Kendall report for The Wall Street Journal. Justice "is examining actions at several poultry companies, the people said, and adds to the scrutiny that U.S. meat processors are facing from the government and their workers. The department has put at least some companies on legal notice that they must preserve documents, several of these people said."

Major poultry processors Pilgrim's Pride and Perdue Farms confirmed they had received such notices; other processors such as Tyson Foods, George's and Sanderson Farms declined to comment. The Justice Department also kept mum.

Lawsuits from poultry-plant workers have alleged that their employers—which control more than 90% of poultry sold in the U.S.—shared data on wages for more than 20 years to keep worker pay down.

"The Justice Department has been broadly looking into alleged antitrust issues in the U.S. meat industry for several years, ranging from charging chicken executives with price fixing to examining meatpackers’ activities in the beef market," the Journal reports. "The Biden administration has alleged that the U.S. meat industry uses its scale to inflate Americans’ food bills, and farm groups have accused meat companies of using their market power to keep livestock prices artificially low." Processors have blamed rising prices on disruptions such as factory fires, pandemic shut-downs, and labor shortages.

In a separate but related case, 10 former poultry executives are being tried in federal court for sharing with each other what prices they charged major restaurant buyers, allegedly in order to keep prices high, the Journal reports. The defendants have all pled not guilty, saying that it's not illegal to share such information, and that there's no proof of a broad conspiracy.

Quick hits: Tips for using drones in journalism; book shows how urban-based news leaves rural residents behind

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email heather.chapman@uky.edu.

Most journalists for nationwide publications work in large cities and produce news with similar audiences in mind. Media scholar Nikki Usher writes about how that alienates rural audiences in her new book News for the Rich, White, and Blue: How Place and Power Distort American Journalism (Columbia University Press, $30). Read more here.

Why the South is the epicenter of anti-abortion sentiment. Read more here.

Housing was already scarce in the Lake Tahoe-area town of Truckee, California; the pandemic-driven remote worker boom made it worse. Read more here.

Here's some tips on using drones for multimedia journalism. Read more here.

Noted Appalachian author Gurney Norman sat down for a chat with Dee Davis of The Daily Yonder after learning that a Kentucky town is naming a new neighborhood after him. Read more here.

A "cookie cutter" nationwide plan to reach Democratic voters won't help rural Democrats, writes a rural political strategist. Read more here.

New Agriculture Department market reports could help cattle producers make more money. Read more here.

For the first time, the average pay for supermarket and restaurant workers nationwide tops $15 an hour, but not everywhere. As competition for workers heats up, large retailers and other major employers are boosting their starting wages. That could help rural employees, where wages tend to be lower, but could hurt smaller local competitors who will feel obliged to follow suit. Read more here.

A soon-to-be-released documentary tells the story of hunger in rural Wisconsin during the first year of the pandemic through the eyes and voices of five rural food pantry directors. Read more here.

Quick hits: Rural libraries could become telehealth hubs; book details Black Appalachians' coal camp experiences

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email heather.chapman@uky.edu.

A new book details the overlooked experience of Black Appalachians in coal camps. Read more here.

Commentary: Rural libraries could use newly available funding opportunities and technologies to become a major player in providing telehealth access. Read more here.

Many rural high-school students want to take Advanced Placement courses, which can award college credit, but school staffing, budgets, and broadband access can make that difficult. Read more here.

More states are considering and passing bills to grant overtime pay to farmworkers. Read more here.

Farmers invited to take survey on employee pay; participants will get access to results, invitation to webinar

Cornell University is looking for farmers to take a short survey about farm employee pay. Though pay isn't the most important factor in retaining and motivating employees, it does matter, but it can be difficult for farmers to find recent, accurate information about how other farmers pay employees. Cornell researchers are gathering the information to help farmers evaluate and offer competitive pay, and also to provide insight about farming to other stakeholders such as researchers or lawmakers.

The survey takes about 10 minutes to fill out. Participants are not paid, but will receive a summary of the results and will be invited to a webinar discussing them. Only aggregate data with no identifying details will be published or shared. Click here for more information about how to participate and a link to the survey.

Rural West Virginians discuss their hopes and fears over the minimum-wage increase debate

"While an effort to raise the national minimum wage from its current $7.25 level without Republican votes was blocked in the Senate this month, congressional Democrats have signaled they plan to try again," Jason Lange and Makini Brice report for Reuters. "The stakes are perhaps nowhere better illustrated than in West Virginia. Its 16 percent poverty rate is among the nation’s highest and its low wages - half its workers earn less than $16.31 an hour - mean it could see some of the biggest risks and rewards of such a move."

Raising the minimum wage to $15 by 2025 would cost the nation between 1.4 million and 2.7 million jobs, as businesses struggle to cope with higher operating costs, according to a February estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. But "in Republican-dominated states, where wages are generally lower than in Democratic-leaning states that are home to America’s biggest cities, the biggest concern is retaining jobs, not raising wages." Lange and Brice report. West Virginia's unemployment rate rose above 15% during the pandemic, higher than the national average. The state's current 6.5% unemployment rate is also higher than the national average. 

"Some experts said job losses could be sharper in rural areas because it will be harder for businesses in small-town America to raise prices enough to offset dramatic increases in pay," Lange and Brice report. For instance, one restaurant owner told Reuters that raising the minimum wage to $15 would be the "death knell" for her business. She couldn't raise the prices on her food enough to cover that wage, and expects she would have to lay off workers.

However, proponents of raising the minimum wage say it won't necessarily result in job cuts, and note that the CBO study projected that increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025 would raise the incomes of 17 million Americans and bring 900,000 out of poverty, Lange and Brice report. 

West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, "a moderate Democrat who opposes the $15 target ... is emerging as a key force in the narrowly divided chamber. Manchin, whose support would be crucial to the success of any legislation on the issue, says he would back an $11 minimum wage, still a more than 50% increase from where it has stood since 2009," Lange and Brice report. "Five Senate Republicans - including West Virginia’s other senator, Shelley Moore Capito - have proposed an increase to $10, suggesting compromise of some kind is possible."

Rural Health Information Hub has new help for covering home health services, which are growing fast but pay poorly

The Rural Health Information Hub, which provides excellent resources for those writing about rural health, has updated its Rural Home Health Services guide to include a more current FAQ and new information on how the coronavirus pandemic has affected home-health agencies.

Home health care is one of the 10 fastest-growing job segments in the U.S., according to Bureau of Labor Statistics figures, but it doesn't pay a living wage. Read more here.

Sioux Falls pork processing plant closes because of coronavirus; it and other closures threaten supply chain

After more than 230 of its workers were found to be sick with covid-19, Smithfield Foods announced on Sunday that it's shuttering its pork processing plant in Sioux Falls until further notice, Tom Polansek reports for Reuters. The closure and others like it could cause food chain problems; they also highlight the poor work conditions at many meatpacking plants that encourage the spread of infectious diseases.

The Sioux Falls plant is one of the nation's largest pork processing facilities, employing about 3,700 and accounting for 4 to 5 percent of U.S. pork production. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem said Saturday that sick Smithfield employees account for 55% of the state's total active covid-19 cases.

The company originally said it would close for three days to clean, after health officials confirmed more than 80 sick workers on Thursday, Makenzie Huber reports for the Argus Leader in Sioux Falls. Smithfield offered employees a one-time $500 "responsibility bonus," but employees and union representatives told Huber they felt unsafe and wanted hazard pay. 

Smithfield isn't the only meatpacker to shutter because of the pandemic. Tyson, Cargill, and JBS USA have all temporarily closed plants because of infected employees, Danielle Wiener-Bronner reports for CNN Business.

The closures highlight working conditions in meatpacking plants that often encourage the spread of infectious diseases. Workers are frequently required to work in close quarters, and, except for unionized plants, workers rarely get sick pay. "At many companies, including Tyson, workers receive disciplinary points for calling in sick. Because points lead to termination, workers told ProPublica, they and some of their colleagues have continued to work even when sick, despite the coronavirus." Michael Grabell reports.

In a statement Sunday, Smithfield CEO Ken Sullivan warned that meatpacking closures will hurt livestock farmers and cause shortages in grocery stores.

Beyond the supply chain problems, the closures could affect trade with China, which has a huge appetite for pork, and is expected to expand pork purchases from the U.S. in 2020 after its own herds have been decimated by disease. U.S. pork processing plant closures could jeopardize that.

Map shows counties economically worse off in 2019 than in 2016; most are rural, and none are in large cities

County economies in 2019 compared to 2016 by three economic measurements: number of jobs, average wages, and unemployment rate. U.S. counties worse off in no or one economic measures are in gray; counties worse off in two economic measures are in coral, and counties worse off in all three economic measures are in red. (New York Times map)

The coronavirus pandemic is expected to lead to a major recession, but many counties still haven't recovered from the last one in 2009. In more than half of U.S. counties, the local economy was worse off in 2019 than it was in 2016 in at least two key economic measures, according to an analysis of data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau.

The New York Times compared data for three economic measures: number of jobs, average wage, and unemployment rate. "Among the 3,142 U.S. counties, more than 1,700 had either fewer jobs, lower inflation-adjusted average wages or a higher unemployment rate in 2019 than in 2016," Jed Kolko reports for the Times. "Almost 500 counties had setbacks in at least two of these three measures (meeting our definition of worse off). A handful of small counties were especially unfortunate, declining on all three measures."

Most of the worse-off counties are rural, and none of the worse-off counties are in the largest metropolitan areas, Kolko reports.