Last month I wrote about the differences between rural and urban economies, this month I continue that theme by looking at other differences between rural and urban households from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS). It is important to note that the ASC defines urban differently than the USDA. The ACS defines cities larger than 2,500 as “urban clusters” and cities larger than 50,000 as “urbanized areas,” all other areas are classified as rural. For example, Beaverhead County has 4,609 urban residents and 4,637 rural residents. Thirty Montana counties are defined as 100% rural, nine counties have between 50% and 99% of their population defined as rural. Urban residents make of more than 50% population in only 16 counties. Overall 44% of Montanans are defined as rural. The percentage of Americans that are defined as rural has been declining for at least 100 years but the number of Americans defined as rural has not changed much in the last 100 years. The second part of this story was a bit of a surprise to me. The key part of this is story is that the US population growth over the past 100 years has been concentrated in urban areas.
Now that we understand the ACS definition of rural, let’s take a look as some differences between rural and urban residents. The rate of homeownership is higher in rural areas (81%) than in urban areas (60%). The median home value in rural areas is nearly $40,000 less than in urban areas. Rural residents that own their home “free and clear” (a property with no mortgage) is 44% which is higher than the 32% of urban residents with a free and clear property. The poverty rate for children in rural areas is 19% while in urban areas it is 22%. The median age of adult rural residents is 51 while in urban areas it is only 45. Nearly 62% of rural adult residents are married compared to 51% of urban adults. Approximately 19% of rural adults have a bachelor’s degree (or higher degree) while 29% of urban adults hold a bachelor’s degree. Rural adults are also much more likely to have been born in the state in which they currently live (65% vs. 48%). The list of differences could go on but I’ll stop here and direct those who want more information to take a look at the ACS report.
There are several key points to take away from this information. The first point is that Montana and the United States are very diverse places in many ways. Things that might seem normal to everyone in a rural community might not be normal to urban areas. The second point is that rural residents are minority (roughly 1 in 5 Americans), even in a rural state like Montana (44%). It seems likely that the trend of urbanization will continue in the coming years due primarily to population growth in urban areas.
