Читать книгу The Country-Life Movement in the United States - L. H. Bailey - Страница 24

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The decline in rural population grows out of economic conditions. Men move to the centers, where they can make the best living for themselves and families. It is difficult, however, for the farmer to "pull up stakes" and move. He is tied to his land. The result is that many men who really could do better in the town than on their farms are still remaining on the land. These persons will continue to remove to towns and cities as they are gradually forced off their lands; or if they are not forced off, their children will go, and the farm will eventually change hands.

Social reasons also have their influence in the movement of rural populations to towns. The social resources in the country in recent years have been very meager, because the social attractions of the towns have drawn away from the activities of the open country, and also more or less because the population itself is decreasing and does not allow, thereby, for so close social cohesion.

It is not to be expected that the counter-movement from the towns and cities to the open country will yet balance in numbers the movement of population from the country to the city.

It is important that conditions be so improved for the open country that those who are born on the farms and who are farm-minded shall feel that opportunities are at least as good for them there as in the city, and thereby prevent the exodus to the city or to other business of persons who really ought to remain in the rural regions.