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Rural Texas: A Snapshot

Defining rural is not a simple matter. Most people “know rural when they see it” but pinning down a single classification system that captures the precise differences between rural and urban areas appears impossible. Even the two federal agencies most involved in defining rural—the U.S. Census Bureau and the Office of Management and Budget—have trouble settling on any one definition. On top of that, each of those definitions are revised at least every 10 years with a new census.

• There are 218 domestic federal funding programs available to Texas’ rural areas. Of these programs, 51 are either limited to rural areas or have some part of benefits directed at rural areas while 3 programs exclude rural and are limited to just urban areas. Each program has its own definition of rural and urban, many of which are based on population levels of 10,000 or fewer.
• According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), 196 of Texas’ 254 counties are rural and of these, 106 are located near one of the state’s 27 metro areas. Less than a quarter (58) of Texas’ counties can be considered urban. Almost the same number (57) of counties are completely rural—containing no town with a population of 2,500 or more—and the rest lie somewhere in between.
• The biggest factor affecting rural growth is a county’s proximity or “adjacency” to a metro area. Adjacent rural counties contain more people on average and show a higher population growth than non-adjacent rural counties.

Age

• On average, rural Texas counties have a bigger share of older citizens than their city counterparts. Rural Texas accounted for a sixth of the state’s population, but was home to one quarter of Texans over 65. The concentration of elderly Texans is greatest—22 percent—in the “most rural” counties.
• This situation, however, is changing. In metro counties, the over-65 population rose more than the total metro population in the 1990s. By contrast, the growth rate over the period for the rural over-65 population was less than half the total rural population growth rate of 9 percent.

Rural Employment and Unemployment

• Employment growth has followed the same general pattern as population—overall, adjacent counties create jobs faster than non-adjacent ones, but metro areas lead both by a comfortable margin.
• Rural services related to recreation, retirement and such natural amenities as mountains, lakes, shorelines, etc. have emerged as important new sources of rural employment and growth and advances in telecommunications are enabling still other types of services—telemarketing, data processing—to move to rural areas.
• According to the USDA, while farming remains important as a source of employment in many rural areas, it is no longer the dominant rural industry, nor is it likely to be so again. Today, the largest share of rural jobs and employment growth comes from various non-agricultural services.

Rural Dividing Lines

• Differences in climate, topography, rainfall, and natural resources all affect county demographics and economics. Among Texas’ rural counties, location in a particular region–north, south, east or west—can mean as much to their economic prospects as adjacency to metro areas.
• The eastern half of Texas is by far the most metropolitan section of the state. This part of the state is seeing fewer rural counties as the urbanized areas expand outward.
• In contrast, the western half of Texas is predominantly rural. Only 14 of the 147 counties located west of Interstate 35 are considered urban.
• Northeast Texas is the most metropolitan region of the state. Of the 47 rural counties in the region only 11 are not adjacent to a metro area. In the region, only four counties are farming-dependent and three are mining-dependent. Between 1970 and 1999, the rural population of this region increased 50 percent and employment increased by 91 percent, the most of any region in the state.
• Northwest Texas is the most rural region. Half of Texas’ rural counties are located in this region, which is the most dependent of the regions on agriculture and oil and gas. Forty-eight of the 65 farming-dependent counties in the state are located in this region and it has the lowest population and employment growth of all of the regions. However, the region had the highest average per capita income level and lowest unemployment rate in the state.
• The Southwest—comprised of 36 counties—is Texas’ fastest-growing region in population. It’s also the poorest of the state’s regions. Ten counties in this region are farming-dependent and seven are mining-dependent. About three-fourths of the Southwest’s rural counties are persistent–poverty counties. The Southwest region has the second-highest employment growth among regions, but also the lowest per-capita income and highest unemployment.

Agriculture, Oil & Gas Markets

• The worldwide markets in which oil, gas and agricultural commodities are traded can make any local economy that depends on them move up and down like a roller-coaster.
• Agricultural prices are subject to unpredictable and uncontrollable events—the development of more cropland in other countries, drought, flood, insect plagues, and hurricanes. In a world market, events on the other side of the globe can affect farmers in Texas.

Agriculture

• Improvements in technology, crop science and farm management have all boosted output while reducing the need for labor.
• While more land is now being farmed in Texas on more farms, the actual size of farms and number of full-time farms has decreased.
• In Texas, agriculture accounts for nearly 13 percent of the jobs in rural counties.
• More than 145 counties in the state rely on farming for 10 percent or more of their employment base and it accounts for more than one-fourth of all employment in 33 rural Texas counties.
• Texas is a leader in the production of many crops and livestock commodities, however the state lags behind other states in some food processing sectors, including those in which Texas raises the greatest amount of raw materials.