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Rural America At A Glance, 2009 Edition

by Lorin Kusmin

Economic Information Bulletin No. (EIB-59) 6 pp, September 2009

Cover Image for EIB59 Update of an annual series, the 2009 edition of Rural America At A Glance deals with effects of the major recession on rural America. Initially, effects of the recession were mitigated in nonmetro areas by high commodity prices throughout much of 2008, but as the recession deepened, prices fell. Both nonmetro and metro areas experienced rising unemployment as manufacturing and other major employment sectors contracted, and they were similarly affected by the mortgage foreclosure crisis. However, even before the current recession, nonmetro poverty rates had risen in the growth years after the 2001 recession, against the usual trend during a time of economic expansion; the nonmetro poverty rate has exceeded the national poverty rate since 2001. The nonmetro population continued to grow in 2007 and 2008, but at less than half the rate of the metro population. Nonmetro growth is largely due to a rise in births, offsetting a decline in net migration from metro to nonmetro areas.

Keywords: Rural indicators, population, housing markets, employment, rural unemployment, nonmetropolitan, nonmetro, rural economy, metro, rural America, census data, population growth, unemployment, poverty, demographics

In this publication...

Charts and graphs (in .png format) from this report are available in the .zip file listed below. The .zip file also contains a document (readme.txt) that lists the name and title of each chart or graph file.

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Last updated: Saturday, May 26, 2012

For more information contact: Lorin Kusmin