For me, the interesting thing about the chart in this post, which was sent to me by a graduate student in economics, Carole Triem, is that, although rural poverty has been rising in recent years, it is still much lower than I expected it to be...
Nonmetro areas have had a higher rate of poverty than metro areas since the 1960s, when poverty rates were first officially recorded. Over time, the difference between nonmetro and metro poverty rates has fluctuated, falling from an average difference of 4.5 percentage points in the 1980s to a record low of 1.6 percentage points in 2010, as the metro poverty rate rose faster than the nonmetro rate over 2006-10. Because of the uneven economic recovery following the 2007-09 economic recession, nonmetro poverty rose slightly in 2011 (to 17.0 percent) and again in 2012 (to 17.7 percent), while the poverty rate fell slightly in metro areas. As a result, the nonmetro poverty rate is at its highest level since 1986 and is now 3.2 percentage points higher than the metro poverty rate. This chart is an updated version of one found in the Rural Poverty and Well-Being topic page on the ERS website.
Even the last record high average percentage difference (4.5) seems not large enough. Considering the high levels of economic productivity generated in metro areas, one would expect the gap to be far greater, around 10 points (or even the 35 points it was in 1959). Why is it so small now? How did it become so small? Did the rural areas become more productive? My guess: To see a glimpse of a possible answer to this mystery, all you might need to do is go down to the post office in the ID...
This office is right in the middle of a dense and very busy area but it's chronically understaffed. If, however, you drive out to the rural areas and visit a post office there, I'm sure you will find nothing like this kind of line in your way. One office is deeply subsidizing the other. Such subsides would, of course, be fine if there was some political alignment between those in metro and nonmetro areas.
