Rural Population and Migration: Trend 2—Nonmetro Population Growth Slows

Rural Population and Migration Briefing Room Trend 1—Harder to Define "Rural" Trend 2—Nonmetro Population Growth Slows Trend 3—Amenities Fuel Rapid Population Growth Trend 4—Natural Decrease on the Rise Trend 5—Diversity Increases in Nonmetro America Trend 6—Challenges From an Aging Population

Nonmetro Population Growth Slower Now Than During the 1990s

Nonmetro counties had 49.9 million residents as of July 1, 2005 as estimated by the Census Bureau, an increase of 2.2 percent since the April 1, 2000 Census tally, compared with a 6 percent rise in metro residents. Natural increase (an excess of births over deaths) provided half of the 1.1 million nonmetro population increase, foreign immigration contributed 322,000 new residents, and a modest net influx of people from U.S. metro areas contributed an increase of 225,000. Though immigration and net domestic migration together contributed only half of overall nonmetro growth since 2000, the growth from migration was much more geographically concentrated than growth from natural increase. Thus, migration choices largely determine the very uneven pattern of population change across nonmetro counties.

Migration trends also play a bigger role in determining the ups and downs of nonmetro population change over time, including recent downward trends. The pattern of increased population retention and growth in nonmetro America during the 1990s was mostly absent in the first 5 years of the new century. On the whole, most nonmetro counties grew more slowly during 2000-05 than in the 1990s, shifted from gain to loss, or increased the pace of loss if they were already declining in the 1990s.

Pace of Nonmetro Population Growth Has Fluctuated Over Time

Such swings in population growth have characterized nonmetro counties for at least a generation, beginning with an unprecedented surge in net inmigration during the 1970s. In that decade, large-scale movement off the farm abruptly declined, suburban expansion into rural territory increased dramatically, and Baby Boomers' entry into the labor market dampened rural outmigration by increasing competition for urban jobs. As a result, nonmetro population gains exceeded those of the previous four decades combined.

The turnaround waned in the 1980s because of renewed rural outmigration. An exceptionally severe farm crisis and economic recessions heavily focused on goods-producing industries made it harder for rural areas to retain current residents or attract new migrants. Also, the pace of suburbanization fell slightly as household formation slowed.

The reversal proved to be short lived, as rural areas and small towns again received an influx of migrants during the 1990s. The overall nonmetro population rebounded despite a fairly substantial decline in growth from natural increase. The recession of the early 1990s disproportionately affected urban, white-collar workers, causing substantial outmigration from hard-hit metro regions, such as southern California. At the same time, digital technologies and the internet were making traditionally urban-based businesses more "footloose," allowing more individuals and families to choose to live and work in rural settings.

Nonmetro Change Tracks Closely With Employment Opportunities

The higher nonmetro population growth of the 1990s did not extend throughout the decade. Rather, the rising movement of people from metro to nonmetro areas that peaked in 1994-95 steadily lessened during the rest of the decade. Thus, the slow pace of population change during 2000-05 actually fits into a longer downward trend. In fact, the rate of nonmetro growth bottomed out in 2000-01 and since then has shown a modest upward trend.

These annual rates of nonmetro population change track closely with indicators of relative changes in metro and nonmetro economic conditions, especially as they affect shifting employment opportunities. For example, nonmetro unemployment rates were lower than metro rates during the rural population "rebound" of the early to mid-1990s, but they were consistently higher from 1996 to 2002 as nonmetro net migration lessened. The most recent data show unemployment rates once again lower in nonmetro areas, at the same time that nonmetro population trends appear to be turning around.

Recent economic restructuring has affected population change in different regions and local contexts throughout nonmetro America. On the one hand, precipitous loss of manufacturing jobs from 1996 to 2002, especially in textiles, dampened population prospects in once-thriving counties throughout the nonmetro Northeast and South. On the other hand, immigrants attracted to low-skill jobs in meatpacking and other food-and-fiber industries have revived population growth in otherwise declining Midwestern counties and added to growth in a number of southern manufacturing centers. Other developments, including the widespread practice of putting new prisons in rural settings and the expansion of casinos throughout the country, has affected new growth in many sparsely settled areas.

However, such economic restructuring trends, and the traditional sectoral divisions between farm and factory, play smaller roles in explaining the selectivity of population growth than in the past. Rapid population growth in rural and small-town America mostly relies on the availability of urban and natural amenities. Patterns continue to be linked to certain county characteristics: substantial growth in retirement and recreation counties; higher-than-average growth in most counties with urban centers or adjacent to metro areas; and loss as a continuing characteristic of counties that are still agriculturally dependent, lacking in urbanization, and remote from large cities.