The Blackwell Companion to Sociology (50 page)

On most indicators of child health (low birthweight, infant mortality, prenatal

care, perceived health status, and acute and chronic health problems), the rates for rural children are comparable to or worse than the rates for poor urban

children. This is the result of a number of factors: ``rural children are more likely than metro children to have no health insurance coverage'' (Sherman, 1992, p.

79); Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements to physicians and hospitals are half

those in urban areas (DeLeon et al., cited in Garrett et al., 1993); and rural areas have a smaller supply of health professionals, including specialists, hospitals, and clinics, than metropolitan areas. Research in the 1980s suggests that ``within the US, areas with poor prenatal care, limited health care, and lower socioeconomic levels have a greater incidence of mental retardation and learning

disabilities'' (Schrag et al., 1983, cited in Garrett et al., 1993, p. 247). Taylor (1999, p. 3) suggests that there is still very little research on rural mental health and family functioning and that this lack is largely a result of ``geographic

isolation, variability across different types of rural settings, the insular nature of many small communities and the stigma associated with formal service use.''

Childcare and Education

Rural families experience greater childcare shortages than urban and suburban

ones. In the rural USA, a smaller supply of regulated group and family-based

childcare is accompanied by a slightly higher need for services because a greater proportion of rural mothers work. Additionally, inadequate transportation

makes accessing these services especially difficult. Finally, on a number of

measures, including staff training and credentials, child-to-staff ratio, and salaries, the quality of childcare is lower in rural areas (Sherman, 1992, pp.

93±106).

In my own research in rural Mississippi in the late 1980s and early 1990s,

I discovered that Headstart, an extremely popular program among the mothers

whom I interviewed, was designed to overcome some of the problems of

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205

isolation, transportation, and staff quality that Sherman (1992) identifies. However, as a result of limited funding the program was not serving all the children who were eligible to participate. In addition, in Mississippi, the founding and

introduction of Headstart was tied to civil rights activity and the program was

initially introduced into the state through the Child Development Group of

Mississippi (Payne, 1995). One outcome was that Headstart was seen as a

black program and eligible white families chose not to take advantage of it.

``Rural children are poorer and attend poorer schools where teachers have less

training and experience . . . and schools offer fewer alternative programs and

advanced classes'' (Sherman, 1992, p. 107). As discussed above, the education

levels and perceived educational competence of the population affects economic

growth and development. Many rural communities find themselves in à`Catch-

22'' situation. They attract only low-wage industries because of a poorly educ-

ated workforce, yet they lack the economic resources necessary to improve

school quality. The need for resources is compounded by the fact that in rural

areas the costs of education are often higher than in urban areas as a result of lower economies of scale which result from serving a small, but geographically

dispersed, population. The educational outcomes for rural children, when com-

pared with their urban and suburban counterparts, are lower levels of achieve-

ment, higher drop-out rates, an increased likelihood of the outmigration of high school graduates, and lower rates of college enrollment (Sherman, 1992, pp.

107±26).

Again, data from my own research in Mississippi provide an example of the

educational liabilities that characterize persistently poor rural counties. Overall funding for public schools is substantially less in Mississippi than in all but two other states. In 1994±5 Mississippi's per pupil public education expenditures

were only $3,798, compared with $5,528 for the USA. Low levels of local

financing for public education explain much of this difference. Local commu-

nities in Mississippi rely more heavily on state and federal funds than the US

average (US Department of Education, 1997).

This lack of local support for public education is the result of a number of

factors; a weak tax base is a contemporary one, but, as Duncan (1999a) points

out, the denial of equal access to education has a long history in some rural

communities. In the Lower Mississippi Delta and in Appalachia in the late

nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, controlling elites deliberately restricted access to education as a means of controlling their workforce. That legacy has

influenced the willingness of many of these communities to invest equally in the education for all of their children (Dill, 1998; Duncan, 1999a).

Housing

Low-income families in rural communities face serious housing shortages. As

poverty has increased, the number of low-rent housing units has dropped sharply

(Lazere et al., cited in Fitchen, 1992). And although housing in rural commu-

nities is less expensive than in urban communities, approximately 42 percent of

the rural poor pay more than half their income for housing (see Fitchen, 1992).

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The result is that an increasing number of rural families face the threat of

homelessness.

Although less prevalent than in urban areas, homelessness does exist in rural

communities, and it is estimated that the rural homeless are younger and more

likely to be female and in families (Hirschl and Momeni, cited in Nord and

Luloff, 1995, p. 462). The housing problems that many poor rural families face

are the result of a number of factors, including a growing demand for low-

income housing accompanied by a diminishing supply, declines in home owner-

ship, a proliferation of land use regulations and housing codes, rising rents, and a volatile housing market in which low-income tenants become extremely vulnerable to changes in the local rental market. In these circumstances, the housing

patterns of rural families which Fitchen (1992) identifies are characterized by

doubling up in short-term arrangements, accepting housing that is seriously

inadequate or unsafe, and moving frequently. Nord and Luloff (1995), in a

study of homeless children and families in rural New Hampshire, found that

homelessness and near homelessness caused children to suffer serious academic

and social setbacks. Among these were exhaustion, lack of designated time and

place to do homework, instability, absences, frequent school changes, and stig-

matization. These and other patterns related to housing cause children to suffer serious setbacks and create hardships for families and children, especially single parent families.

Public Assistance

The literature on public assistance and rural communities, for the most part, was written before implementation of TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy

Families, a provision of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity

Reconciliation Act of 1996). Nevertheless, the findings are useful to convey

the context surrounding public assistance in many rural communities and to

provide a contrast with urban settings.

In 1990, fewer than 47 percent of rural poor families with children received

Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) or related benefits (Sherman,

1992). The usage of food stamps was slightly higher and almost on a par with

urban communities. According to Jensen and Eggebeen (1994), rural children's

parent(s) are more likely to work. However, working was also likely to make

families ineligible for welfare. In their 1994 study of the ameliorative effects of public assistance on the economic well-being of rural children between 1970

and 1990, Jensen and Eggebeen conclude that, ``compared with metro poor

children, non-metro poor children are less likely to receive public assistance

and receive less in total benefits when they do. Both factors conspire to produce a sizable non-metro disadvantage in the poverty alleviating impact of public

assistance.''

However, because rural wages are low, the greater engagement of rural par-

ents in the workforce did not reduce poverty for rural children. Thus, even

before TANF was initiated, Jensen and Eggebeen (1992) cautioned that ``the

ameliorative effects of work should not be overestimated.'' This conclusion was

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207

based on a study by Lichter and Eggebeen (1993), which found that a 50 percent

increase in employment among poor, female-headed families led to only a 26

percent reduction in their poverty rate.

My own work (Dill, 1998) and that of Taylor (1999) provide some insights

into the resources and barriers to implementing work opportunity programs in

rural communities. Rural women we studied have both work experience and a

desire for employment. Many also have a support network that facilitates work-

ing and, according to Taylor, strengthens mental health by reducing depressive

symptoms. But at the same time, the women face significant barriers to work,

including geographic isolation and lack of transportation, limited access to

childcare, and, most significantly, the lack of availability of work that pays a living wage and makes it possible for them to support their families over an

extended period of time.

Rural Communities: Unraveling the Legacy

In an effort to draw attention to the plight of rural America and to the growing similarities between persistently poor non-metropolitan areas and urban central

cities that garner most of the nation's attention regarding poverty, rural scholars and writers have adopted the language of urban poverty. Terms like ghetto and

underclass have been used to highlight the depths of rural poverty. Certainly, an examination of the data on rural poverty suggests that these problems are

profound and that they are not isolated from the poverty of urban communities.

In the long run, however, the borrowed terminology may obscure more than it

clarifies. Poverty in rural communities derives from many of the same sources as urban poverty and has many similar aspects, but rural poverty also has a

distinctive character. To a large extent, this character is the result of a historical legacy shaped by the organization of work, the role of race and gender, and the

structure of class relations. The industries that were central to the formation of these communities and the ways in which social, political, and economic life

were organized around them have had a tremendous impact on the prospects

and possibilities of rural communities today. This heritage which has shaped the present must be understood and accounted for if interventions for change are to

be successful.

The peculiar character of rural communities is well demonstrated in Cynthia

Duncan's recent book, Worlds Apart (1999a). The book is a study of three poor

rural communities: Blackwell, in Appalachia; Dahlia, in the Lower Mississippi

Delta; and Gray Mountain, in Northern New England. In it, she argues that

studying rural communities provides a unique opportunity to view, in micro-

cosm, the relations between macroeconomic processes ± such as restructuring,

local political and social arrangements, and the daily lives of individuals. This face-to-face, personalized view of the interactions of race relations, class structures, and daily life helps to penetrate surface similarities between urban and

rural communities and reveals a detailed patterning of relationships that must be understood before social change can take place.

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In her study, Duncan (1999a) finds that the poor communities in the Delta and

Appalachia are made up, essentially, of two classes: the haves and the have-nots.

The haves are upper-class families who control the resources and participate in

mainstream economic and political life. The have-nots are lower-class families

who are powerless, dependent, and do not participate. These patterns of social

life are rooted in the historical economic organization of the communities. In

Blackwell Appalachia, the power of the haves derives from that of the coal

barons; in Dahlia, Mississippi, it derives from the plantation bossmen (Duncan,

1999a, pp. 191±2).

Civic relations in these communities are permeated by distrust and greed. In

Appalachia the primary schism is along class lines, with the small group of

middle-class professionals and entrepreneurs aligning themselves with the

upper class. In Dahlia, the community divides along both racial and class lines.

The upper class is white, and the small white middle class identifies strongly with them. The lower class is predominantly (and in some counties, almost exclusively) black. Middle-class blacks find themselves divided between an old guard

with long-standing ties to the white community and the maintenance of the

status quo and a new group of professionals, former civil rights activists and

return migrants who are working to bring about change and improve conditions

for themselves and the lower class. Life in Dahlia and Blackwell contrasts

sharply with that in Gray Mountain, `à blue-collar mill town where mill work-

ers, civic leaders and business owners have worked together and invested in