Re: Here's what's going on in rural USA

Posted by dhermesc on June 20, 2007 at 05:46:20 from (24.248.193.103):

In Reply to: WHATS going on in rural USA posted by marlowe on June 19, 2007 at 17:49:28:

Where you been? This has been going on for 30 years. The guys below are right - its the Wal-Mart effect (bigger and bigger is better) only it applies to the entire rural industry not just some meaningless box store.

Small towns like that depend on the rural community to survive, their own population isnt enough to support squat. With farms doubling and tripling and more in size every decade means that there are 1/2 to 1/3 the rural households to support the small town businesses every decade. Then couple that with the fact that the average farmer is about 62 years old he probably doesn't have any kids in the house (unless he a spy old guy with a young wife).

The increasing size of the farms has wiped out well over half the households and the increasing age of the farmers has wiped out the 2.3 kids (or in my dad's case the 12 kids) that would have lived in the surviving households. So you've knocked out almost 80% of the rural population that supported those little towns of 800 to 1500 people (and they say their population is getting old too). So the schools shrink, the businesses do a lot less business and everyone on the street has grey hair.

Blame "Wal-Mart" all you want but Wal-Mart doesn't run corner cafes or feed stores or banks (yet) or impliment dealerships or sell barb wire. The population that supported all those businesses just isn't there anymore.

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