
From the $20 billion Intel semiconductor factory by Intel in New Albany, Ohio, to the $100-billion commitment by Micron in Upstate New York, corporate America is betting big on the fortunes of small-town economies. Reversing historic trends, higher-than-average growth was experienced in non-metro counties in every state in this region.Īs a result, many outlying counties across the country are now reaping record industrial investment windfalls. One notable standout is the swath known as the Great Plains. Paul and Dallas-Fort Worth, according to this same report.

Others can be found adjacent to large metro areas, such as Nashville, Minneapolis-St. These include outlying counties in rural locations like the southern Appalachians, the Ozarks, the upper Great Lakes and the intermountain West. USDA research shows that places once considered far-flung now rank among the most attractive magnets for in-migration. There have been tremendous increases in real estate prices in even the so-called affordable metros.” It is not as cheap as it used to be to live in big cities, even when those cities are in the Midwest. “The price-to-income ratio in Columbus, Ohio, has increased by 50%. “Urban real estate prices are going up,” says Renn. What’s happening? More in-depth research using Internal Revenue Service data reveals that the trend of people moving outward from large central cities actually began a few years before the pandemic and is continuing well after the peak COVID-19 years of 20.Īaron Renn, a former senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Public Research, tells Site Selection that record inflation, remote working, rising big-city crime and lifestyle changes are prompting Americans to relocate from large urban cores to the hinterlands. These high-population counties saw domestic migration outflows of more than 1.1 million people, according to Census data. In fact, the only areas that did not experience populations gains across the country last year were the urban cores. Exurban counties grew by 1.9% while suburban counties grew by 1.5%. That trend continued in 2022 as the counties in outlying areas, including suburbs, exurbs and rural counties, saw their populations grow the fastest. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, the overall rate of non-metro-area population growth during 2020-2021 (0.25%) exceeded the national rate (0.12%) for the first time since the mid-1990s. Recent data from the federal government back this up.


What many thought was just a blip during the COVID-19 pandemic - people fleeing big cities for the open space of suburbs, exurbs and rural small towns - has turned into a long-term trend. F you want to gain a competitive edge in the race to hire talent, you may want to consider doing what many American workers have already done: Move out of the big city.
