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The title could be changed to: "What happens to thousands of tiny towns when the big business that brought the town into existence stops making money". Old min
by strommen 11y ago
The title could be changed to: "What happens to thousands of tiny towns when the big business that brought the town into existence stops making money".
Old mining and factory towns are extremely sad. When the region stops generating the value that drove its initial growth, the result is an endless downward spiral to widespread poverty. Lots of former workers are unable to make a transition to another job. The only real money left is in the retirement accounts of those who "made it" before the layoffs, and the only jobs available are in the service industry catering to these folks. That money and those jobs eventually fade away. The youngest and most capable workers see the writing on the wall and get out of Dodge. Others hang on as long as they possibly can.
Of course Wal-Mart can't make a profit selling a full-size warehouse full of cheap goods in an area like this. Nobody can. But now that they're gone, somebody will succeed with a small, overpriced grocery store that pays local teenagers minimum wage and has a produce section the size of my bathroom. And even that store will go downhill over time as the people with money continue to pass away and move out.
I wish I knew the solution to this problem.
- ghaff 11y agoI often wonder, when driving through remote rural communities, how the economics work. I expect what you wrote is generally the case. Retired people with some savings and/or pensions, social security, etc. plus a minimal service economy for those people.
- strommen 11y agoFarms (and the supporting industries) make money. Less so today than they used to, but still enough to sustain small rural towns.
- planteen 11y agoBy used to, do you mean in 2012 when corn was around $7 / bu? Your typical "field" in the Midwest is a quarter or 160 ac. Iowa has a yield of around 170 bu/ac and a typical farmer might have around 8 quarters. If corn is around $4, that works out to 8x160x170x4 = $870k revenue by a farmer for a year (and almost 2x that in 2012!)
- douche 11y agoPeople travel distances that would be unimaginable for some of us to get to work. 30-40 miles one way is not terribly rare. Or they spend the week living at the job site, and go home for the weekends.
- ghaff 11y agoI'm not sure 30-40 miles one way is terribly unusual even in relatively urbanized coastal areas :-) But I agree with your basic point. I'm not personally familiar with how shifts typically work with oil drilling on land, but when I was working in the offshore drilling industry it was week-on/week-off in the Gulf and many of the workers came significant distances--often from rural towns in Louisiana, Mississippi, or Alabama.
- wushupork 11y agoIn the SF Bay area, lots of people regularly trek from South Bay to work in SF - often between 60+ - 30 miles each way. Whenever I need to go into the city, it's 55miles each way. Fortunately I don't have to do it daily but it sucks when I do as its almost always rushhour.
- randycupertino 11y agoDisability has increasingly become the new stopgap for welfare. Many rural and blue collar workers who can't find jobs are applying for and getting on disability. see: http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/
- fnordfnordfnord 11y agoI'd bet the isn't a single town that was brought into existence by Walmart. Before Walmart, you had a variety store, hardware, auto parts, and a grocery. After Walmart you'll get a dollar store in its place. As to why small communities can't seem to solve the fresh produce problem, I'm at a loss. I live in a rural farming community and we can't get fresh produce. I can't decide whether to order produce delivered from Austin or start a local produce delivery myself. Currently we make a weekly trek to civilization and fill our minivan to bursting with food and supplies.
- rahimnathwani 11y ago"I'd bet the isn't a single town that was brought into existence by Walmart." I don't think that was the parent comment's point. The factories and mines created the towns and thereby generated the demand for the Walmart. Now those factories and mines no longer exist, so Walmart is no longer needed.
- LeifCarrotson 11y agoA rural farming community doesn't produce year-round goods managed through greenhouses and southern hemisphere producers and a cold warehousing and shipping industry. It produces a couple weeks of huge quantities of one or two kinds of produce a couple times a year.
- fnordfnordfnord 11y agoYou might be surprised. I'm on the Gulf Coast where the growing season is long. We have rice, cotton, corn, soy, locally as well as two large vegetable farms with I don't even know how many acres of greenhouses. The large vegetable farms sell most of their produce to chain-grocer warehouses and restaurant suppliers. They will sell to the public, but don't really seem to like doing so.
- LeifCarrotson 11y agoA rural farming community doesn't produce year-round goods managed through greenhouses and southern hemisphere producers and a cold warehousing and shipping industry. It produces a couple weeks of huge quantities of one or two kinds of produce a couple times a year.
- mjevans 11y agoMy own feelings are that a solution lies somewhere in the national park spectrum. The land isn't productive to society as a whole anymore, and therefore should be repurchased (at favorable rates to society; but still enough to allow the locals to escape the area) and returned to being a nature reserve. This way the area is returned to the commons and the suffering of all life is reduced.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoI'd love to work on a project such as this. It seems like the ideal solution with the ongoing influx of rural citizens to major metros.