Rural folks:
Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released its annual survey
of rural America, which puts the divergence in stark relief.
Non-metropolitan areas experienced their first recorded period of
population loss, and a decline in the labor force participation rate
pushed unemployment down slightly (though the jobless rate surpassed the
urban unemployment rate earlier this year). But even as the rest of the
country entered a tepid recovery, and some rural areas gained jobs from
the natural gas boom, net employment didn't budge rural regions:
The bifurcation adds another dimension to the widening political and social urban-rural divide.
The Department of Agriculture has a whole division devoted to rural issues, which is aimed at fixing the jobs problem
through initiatives such as farming cooperatives and infrastructure
development. But the long-term problem might be more structural in
nature, as the USDA suggests in its finding that suburbanization is
slowing down:
The housing mortgage crisis slowed suburban development
and contributed to an historic shift within metro regions, with outlying
metro counties now growing at a slower rate than central counties.
Similarly, nonmetro counties adjacent to metro areas that had been
growing rapidly from suburban development for decades declined in
population for the first time as a group during 2010-12. This period may
simply be an interruption in suburbanization or it could turn out to be
the end of a major demographic regime.
It's important to note, though, that not all cities have recovered equally from the recession.
As much as I love this part of the country, we are getting killed. It just isn't good.
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