The Kansas Reflector’s Allison Kite and Kevin Hardy reported Monday that “disappearing water” in the Ogallala Aquifer, which stretches from South Dakota to Texas, “is threatening more than just agriculture. Rural communities are facing dire futures where water is no longer a certainty. Across the Ogallala, small towns and cities built around agriculture are facing […]
Rural America
An Overview of Some COVID Related Impacts on Rural America from USDA’s Economic Research Service
Last week, the USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS) released its annual report exploring characteristics and economic indicators associated with Rural America : “Rural America at a Glance: 2020 Edition.”
Rural America: Perspective from USDA Report, and Federal Reserve Ag Credit Survey
On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released its annual Rural America at a Glance report, which summarizes the status of conditions and trends in rural areas. In addition, the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis recently provided details of its third quarter Agricultural Credit Conditions Survey, which follows on the heels of recent third quarter agricultural reports from four other federal reserve districts. Together, the USDA report and Minneapolis Fed update, provide some interesting perspective on the state of non-metro America.
Rural Economy: Farm Income, Manufacturing- Both Important Variables
The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) indicated in a news release last week that, “State personal income grew 0.7 percent on average in the second quarter of 2017, after increasing 1.4 percent in the first quarter, according to estimates released [Tuesday] by [BEA].” However, the release added that, “Farm earnings declined for the nation and in every state in the second quarter and was the leading contributor to slow earnings growth in many states.”
Rural Broadband Issues- Farms Connecting to the Internet
Today’s update discusses rural broadband issues and federal regulatory action that was taken this month to help close the digital divide in Rural America. The update also touches on a couple of legislative proposals regarding broadband expansion, and highlights a recent USDA survey that documents how many farmers are using the Internet and how they are currently connecting.
Rural America “Stranded in the Dial-Up Age,” Rural Broadband Issues
Last month, a Wall Street Journal article provided an in-depth look at a variety of statistical indicators from rural America in an article titled, “Rural America is the New, ‘Inner City.'” That article explained that, “In terms of poverty, college attainment, teenage births, divorce, death rates from heart disease and cancer, reliance on federal disability insurance and male labor-force participation, rural counties now rank the worst among the four major U.S. population groupings (the others are big cities, suburbs and medium or small metro areas).” The Journal continued its “One Nation, Divisible” series with a front page article in Friday’s paper that focused on a different aspect of rural development: Broadband Internet access.
Wall Street Journal Looks at Rural America, “The New ‘Inner City'”
Janet Adamy and Paul Overberg reported on the front page of Saturday’s Wall Street Journal that, “At the corner where East North Street meets North Cherry Street in the small Ohio town of Kenton, the Immaculate Conception Church keeps a handwritten record of major ceremonies. Over the last decade, according to these sacramental registries, the church has held twice as many funerals as baptisms. In tiny communities like Kenton, an unprecedented shift is under way. Federal and other data show that in 2013, in the majority of sparsely populated U.S. counties, more people died than were born—the first time that’s happened since the dawn of universal birth registration in the 1930s.”
The Importance of the Non-Farm Rural Economy to Farm Household Income
A recent study (“Income Trends for Iowa Farms and Farm Families 2003-2015”) by David Peters, associate professor and extension rural sociologist with Iowa State University, summarized current trends in farm income by type of farm operation and pointed to more specific issues regarding the importance of non-farm income to the financial picture of farm households.