Inflation is crushing rural America

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https://www.npr.org/2022/07/25/1112915507/inflation-rural-america-gas-prices-economy

Inflation is crushing rural America and driving some people to consider moving closer to cities in an effort to ease the financial stress, according to the latest analysis from one expert.

Iowa State University professor Dave Peters has been studying the effect of inflation on people in rural communities as part of the school's Small Town Project. He found that this year alone, expenses for rural Americans had increased by 9.2%, but their earnings only increased by 2.6%.

And Peters has pinpointed where it's hurting most.

"Mainly, fuel prices, particularly among the farmer and agricultural community," he said. "They really are worried about the price of gas and diesel."

Inflation soared to a 40-year high in June, and is affecting all American households. But Peters said travel was one of the main reasons it was hitting harder in rural areas.

"Rural people have to drive long distances for work, for school, for health care, just to get the daily necessities of life like groceries ... there is no public transportation," he said.

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This migration towards cities is hardly surprising. There's a reason why huge quarters of Spain and France lay empty, and most of the population is concentrated in towns. The marginal cost to support an additional town-dweller is minimal, because most of the infrastructure needed to support them is already built and paid for.

The American workforce, by and large, is not one concentrated in agriculture or manufacturing, but in services. A huge rural population in an environment where most commercial agriculture operations can be done by only a few workers with advanced machinery actually imposes huge opportunity costs.

On the first part, I know at least one city councilor who disagrees with you.

I can't find any quote, but local city councilor Harold Steves has argued that the incremental cost of population growth is greater than the increase to the tax base.

I don't know if he's correct, but an increase in city population can mean having to build new schools, upgrade the water and sewage, add new streets and upgrade them more frequently...

If anything, I think this argues that if population is going to increase in a city, then it should be done with as great a density as can be handled and not some kind of urban sprawl. Greater density can actually decrease traffic and probably does not require as high other incremental costs.

Seems to me that "density" is an anathema to the rural dweller.

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I do believe many left-wing voters (around the world, but especially in this country) secretly hold serious contempt for rural areas, their lifestyles, and their values, and therefore see any sort of negative development in rural America that pushes it’s populace to urban areas as a good thing, where they can accept urban, progressive values.

Many of us grew up in areas that made us feel unwelcome and pushed us out for being too gay, the wrong color, not Christian or the right kind of Christian, too interested in books, too ambitious, not into the same sports and music they loved. And when we moved to cities to build a new life, they blame us for not loving and respecting them from afar and because they don’t have the same standard of living after they chased out anyone with any ambition or who was different in any way and saw the jobs go with us.

Rural victim complex is so boring. Your problems are self-inflicted. My hometown is worse off because I and many of my friends left - but they didn’t want me to be there as a gay man.

This is an interesting post. I know nothing about rural living, I'm a city girl all the way. What you said hit a true tone about people's differences not being tolerated. Frankly, who needs communities like this? They take up space and what do they give back that helps other people? They seem to live in a closed-off world of non-reality, and Trump support. Am I wrong?

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I see the rural understanders have logged on. If y'all want mass farmer protests like what we're seeing in the Netherlands, you're doing everything right. Don't piss off the people who grow your food and produce your energy.

They only grow some of the food. Food is grown all over. And as for energy, that is generated all over as well, and getting more and more that way.

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Those same rural voters will deliver a GOP Congress that will immediately pass tax cuts for the rich. So why is there such a huge disconnect between what their reality is and and what their politcal action and advocacy is?

I wonder about this all the time. You put the question clearly.

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Those same rural voters will deliver a GOP Congress that will immediately pass tax cuts for the rich. So why is there such a huge disconnect between what their reality is and and what their politcal action and advocacy is?

I wonder about this all the time. You put the question clearly.

Republicans frame the tax cuts as tax cuts for the small business owner, which is a classic republican constituency.

Why need a college education when you can start your own business and not depend on Government or an employer to make a living ?

Because it's not all about business. People matter just as much or more, than the business community. I believe the business sector should serve the people they get their money from, not just try to take the whole pie for themselves.

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Those same rural voters will deliver a GOP Congress that will immediately pass tax cuts for the rich. So why is there such a huge disconnect between what their reality is and and what their politcal action and advocacy is?

I wonder about this all the time. You put the question clearly.

Republicans frame the tax cuts as tax cuts for the small business owner, which is a classic republican constituency.

Why need a college education when you can start your own business and not depend on Government or an employer to make a living ?

Because it's not all about business. People matter just as much or more, than the business community. I believe the business sector should serve the people they get their money from, not just take the whole pie for themselves.

You misunderstand me.

In the rural republican mindset, small business owners are the people. They make up probably 50 percent of the town. The small shops. The realtor. The self
Employed electricians. Main Street. Skilled tradesmen.

In Marxist theory, people call them the petty bourgeoise.

Compare these people to say the democratic base. White collar workers. Tech workers. Professionals. They are more cosmopolitan.

OK. That's interesting. And who is the other 50%?

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Someone mentioned the "victim" mentality of the rural areas. I don't know how you deal with that. The Republicans seem to think it's ok to capitalize on it for their own benefit. Frankly, my perception is that the rural dwellers live in the backwoods of time and are dragging down the rest of the country from progressing in modern ways. How do you fix that? Most people don't want to go backwards in time.

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Here's an interesting article I found about why Democrats keep losing rural counties. Biden made an effort to connect, but I guess the "rural consciousness" runs too deep.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/12/01/democrats-rural-vote-wisconsin-441458

Why did Trump do so well with rural voters? From my experience, it’s not because local Democrats failed to organize in rural areas. Instead, after conversations with dozens of voters, neighbors, friends and family members in Dunn County, I’ve come to believe it is because the national Democratic Party has not offered rural voters a clear vision that speaks to their lived experiences. The pain and struggle in my community is real, yet rural people do not feel it is taken seriously by the Democratic Party.

Trust is earned slowly. It can’t be earned back with campaign slogans or TV ads. When people feel left behind, they look for a way to make sense of what is happening to them. There is a story to be told about rural America, yet Democrats are not telling it. That leaves an opening for other stories to be told to fill the vacuum—stories that villainize and divide us along racial, geographic and partisan lines. That is the story Trump told, but it’s the wrong one. The real story is that rural people feel our way of life is being sold off. We see the wealth of our sweat and soil being sent away to enrich executives, investors and shareholders.

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It seems to be true that rural America and urban America are two different countries. How do we co-exist and get anything done?