Category: Rural

Veterans with service-related disabilities are concentrated in the American South and in rural places, this new fact sheet finds. Issued to commemorate Veterans Day (November 11), the report analyzes new data from the U.S. Census Bureau's 2008 American Community Survey, which released service-related disability data for the first time.

In this brief Carsey Senior Demographer Kenneth Johnson examines rural demographic trends between 2010 and 2020 using data from the 2020 Census. With fewer births, more deaths, and more people leaving than moving in, rural America experienced an overall population loss for the first time in history.

This issue brief describes how the census is conducted in rural areas, identifies some of the most difficult rural areas to count, and highlights what organizations are doing to ensure a more accurate census count in rural America. It also points out that undercounting by the census can lead to communities not receiving a fair share of federal funding.

This Carsey brief looks at the geographic distribution of health insurance for children. Based on data from the 2008 American Community Survey, it includes such findings as one in ten children are still uninsured, insurance rates vary considerably by geographic area, and rural children are most likely to depend on public plans for their health care.

Despite a flurry of reports on health insurance coverage for children, virtually none of them have examined the unique situation of rural families where one-fifth of all the nation's poor children live. This brief takes an in-depth look at the health insurance programs, such as SCHIP and Medicaid, which rural children rely on for medical care.

This brief examines rural demographic trends in the first decade of the twenty-first century using newly available data from the 2010 Census. The rural population grew by just 2.2 million between 2000 and 2010—a gain barely half as great as that during the 1990s. Population growth was particularly slow in farming and mining counties and sharply reduced in rural manufacturing counties.

This policy brief examines who is taking care of preschoolers of employed mothers in rural America. While most rural families choose home-based child care (such as relatives or informal nonrelated care providers), formal care (such as in day care centers) has positive benefits to a child's development. The brief recommends that programs are needed that either make formal care more affordable and accessible in rural communities, or that train home-based care providers to provide quality care.

When the nation goes to war, all Americans are expected to make sacrifices. Today's rural Americans, however, have fewer job opportunities within their communities, and are joining the military at higher rates. In turn, rural communities are facing military losses in disproportionate numbers to their urban counterparts.

This brief, using data from the 2008 National Study of the Changing Workforce (NSCW) survey, analyzes paid sick time rates of workers by place and type of work. Paid sick days provide job protection to workers and a steady paycheck when they need to care for themselves or family members. Paid sick days also help workers with more limited resources who cannot otherwise afford to take a day off. Authors Kristin Smith and Andrew Schaefer report that a greater proportion of rural workers than urban workers (both suburban and central-city) lack access to at least five paid sick days per year. Their analysis suggests that where one works matters, both geographically and by sector, and the quality of the job also matters. The rural disadvantage is particularly pronounced among rural private-sector workers and part-time workers, but even rural full-time workers have less access to paid sick days than their urban counterparts.