Rural Growth Is Real; But It Looks Different

By Stacy Davis, Sumner County Economic Development

When we talk about growth in rural America, I think we sometimes make the mistake of believing there are only two possibilities: a community is booming, or it is dying. I don’t believe either one tells the whole story.

The current rural climate is complicated. There are communities gaining people and communities losing them. There are businesses expanding while others struggle to find workers. There are new families choosing small towns while longtime residents are getting older. There are communities landing multimillion-dollar projects while still trying to figure out how to build enough housing, provide childcare or keep a grocery store open.

That is rural America in 2026.

The first thing we need to do is be honest about where we are.

According to the USDA Economic Research Service, the population of nonmetropolitan America reached approximately 46.2 million people in 2024. More importantly, the rural population has now increased every year since 2020 after nearly a decade of population loss. That’s good news.

But, there is another side to that number.

Between 2020 and 2024, 51% of nonmetro counties still lost population. Growth has been strongest in rural counties near metropolitan areas, recreation-based communities and several parts of the South and Mountain West. Many communities across the Great Plains, including portions of Kansas, continue to struggle with population decline.

So, no, rural America’s challenges haven’t disappeared, but something interesting has changed. People are still willing to choose rural areas.

Between 2020 and 2024, migration added approximately 974,000 people to nonmetro counties. Roughly 69% of that gain came from domestic migration. In fact, about 65% of nonmetro counties experienced positive net migration during that period.

Think about what that tells us. People aren’t automatically rejecting rural communities. Some are actively choosing them.

The bigger challenge is that births are no longer keeping pace with deaths in much of rural America. From 2020 through 2024, natural population change reduced the rural population by more than 563,000 people, and 76% of nonmetro counties recorded more deaths than births in the most recent year measured. That means recruiting and retaining people isn’t just an economic development strategy anymore. For many rural communities, it is a population strategy.

Our workforce tells a similar story. Rural employment finally surpassed its pre-pandemic level in 2024, reaching approximately 20 million employed residents. Prime-age labor force participation in rural America reached 79.3%, nearly returning to its 2008 level.

Once again, there is another side of the story.

The rural population ages 65 and older has grown to nearly 10 million people, representing about 21.5% of the nonmetro population. At the same time, the number of prime-working-age rural residents declined by approximately 1.4 million people between 2010 and 2024. That is why employers across rural America can simultaneously say, “Business is good,” and, “We can’t find enough people.” Both can be true.

This is why housing, childcare, healthcare, education and quality of life aren’t side conversations in economic development anymore. They are workforce development.

Here’s another number worth remembering. Small businesses are still carrying rural communities. Small businesses account for 56.6% of employment outside metropolitan areas, compared with 47.5% inside metropolitan areas. There are approximately 4.3 million small-business establishments in rural areas. That local contractor, coffee shop, manufacturer, daycare provider, retailer, restaurant or entrepreneur isn’t simply a nice addition to the community. They are part of the economic infrastructure.

Our traditional industries still matter too. Manufacturing accounted for approximately 13.3% of nonmetro employment in 2024, while healthcare and social assistance represented about 14.1%, making it the largest employment sector in rural America.

The rural economy isn’t one thing anymore. Agriculture matters. Manufacturing matters. Healthcare matters. Entrepreneurship matters. Remote work matters. Tourism matters. Energy matters. Increasingly, technology and broadband matter. That diversification may be one of rural America’s greatest opportunities.

We also need to redefine growth. For a community of 2,000 people, growth doesn’t have to mean becoming a community of 20,000. Growth could mean adding 25 families or filling ten vacant houses. Maybe it means helping five existing businesses expand or bringing home six former students. It could mean creating 40 childcare slots or keeping the hospital open. Maybe it means turning an empty downtown building into three apartments and a new business. Or, it could mean getting the right infrastructure in place so the next opportunity doesn’t pass us by.

We have spent a lot of years measuring rural success against urban numbers. It’s time we stop doing that. A project creating 25 jobs in a community of 2,500 people can have an enormous impact. A new business employing eight people matters. One physician moving to town matters. One young family choosing to stay matters. One entrepreneur deciding that their idea can succeed in rural America matters.

Growth also requires us to make choices. We cannot say we want growth while fighting every change growth requires. We cannot recruit families without housing. We cannot recruit employers without workers. We cannot recruit workers without childcare. We cannot talk about quality of life while refusing to invest in parks, schools, healthcare, downtowns and community amenities. We cannot tell people we want them to move to our communities and then make newcomers feel like outsiders for the next twenty years.

Growth requires infrastructure, but it also requires the right attitude. The communities that succeed over the next decade won’t just be the ones with the largest incentive packages or the newest industrial parks, they will be the communities that decide they are willing to prepare for opportunity before opportunity arrives. They will invest. They will collaborate. They will welcome new people. They will support their existing businesses. They will tell their story. Most importantly, they will believe that their community still has a future.

Maybe that is the real conversation we need to be having about rural growth.

When you look out at your community, growth does not always look like more rooftops, more traffic, or a bigger population sign. Sometimes it looks like a young family moving home, a local business expanding, a vacant building finding new life, or someone deciding to take a chance on the community that raised them.

We may not be able to control every trend or change every statistic, but we can control how we respond, where we invest, and whether we are willing to work together to move our community forward.

Keep believing in rural America, keep investing in the places we call home, and remember that sometimes growth is not about becoming bigger. Sometimes it is simply about becoming stronger.