Annual Figures Show Slight Rise In Rural Jobs, But Gap With Metro Widens
“Rural counties had 750,000 fewer jobs in 2017 than they did in 2008. That’s a drop of 3.5 percent over the nine-year period. Meanwhile, the nation’s largest metropolitan areas (those with populations of 1 million or more) climbed out of their job deficit by 2012. In 2017 they had 10 percent more jobs than they did in 2008. That’s an increase of 7.8 million jobs. (Major metropolitan counties are shown in the red line in the graph at the top of the story.)”