Small Town USA

Late Victorian wooden family homes with the famous rocking chair on the front porch, surrounded by wheat fields and endless green prairie, and of course the flag in the front yard: our picture of the United States comes from movies, the romance of country songs and landscape photography. Yet today only about a fifth of the total population lives in America's rural, sometimes remote areas.

The vast stretch between the Great Lakes and California, from North Texas to the lonely Mountain States, with the Great Plains and the Midwest, America's "breadbasket", in between, makes up most of the United States, not just by area but culturally too. This is where the frontier spirit is still alive, ever since the Homestead Act of 1862 allowed every adult American to head west, stake a claim to 64 hectares of land and farm it. Many of those farms are still around today, and tradition still matters in the heart of America.

1America: more than New York and LA

Of course, when we think of America, we also picture the New York skyline, the Golden Gate Bridge or the architectural marvels of Neutra and Schindler. In fact, around 80 percent of Americans live in urban areas. That figure, however, includes metro areas like Chicago, Houston or Philadelphia, which can take in smaller, politically independent cities and towns. The sprawling suburbs sometimes have more residents than the city itself.

Still, there is a growing trend you could call sub-suburbanization. Ever since remote work became the norm in many white-collar jobs, lots of Americans have been heading back out to the countryside. All you need there is a working internet connection and your office is set. On top of that, low rents, a largely conservative and close-knit community and family-friendly small towns lure stressed-out city dwellers away from the urban grind.

2Remote work is fueling rural growth

Many rural communities are now benefiting greatly from this trend. They actively court well-educated employees and freelancers. Many towns even reward newcomers with free land, temporary tax breaks or even cash.

Jasper, Indiana, for example, pays $5,000 to anyone who moves to this family-friendly small town, where the average age is just forty and the median income of $40,000 promises an affordable life.

A handful of small towns in southwest Michigan pay a bonus of $15,000 if you settle in the ZIP codes between 49106 and 49084. On top of that, you get free access to coworking spaces, free airport transfers and an annual pass for the South Shore Line.

Curtis, Nebraska, stays true to the Homestead Act to this day and gives anyone who wants to move there a plot of land plus $5,000. Mankato, Kansas, population 800, also offers free land. Then again, according to one survey, Mankato is the most boring town in America. Stillwater, Oklahoma, may not be much more exciting, but it offers a $2,000 coffee voucher! Often, common sense sets tighter limits on these ideas than creativity does.

Overview of the town offers mentioned in this article. Programs change; the details published by each town are what count.

3Big cash bonuses for moving to the middle of nowhere

If you don't mind rural solitude, you'll be happy in Bloomfield, Iowa: move to this small town and you get $10,000 in cash. Choose the even more rural surroundings and you get half as much again on top. The small town of Britt in Hancock County, in the same state, offers similar sums. Life in the heartland may be slower, maybe even a little boring, but the schools are considered excellent and are free, which especially attracts families with children. That makes the daily school bus ride easy to live with.

The college town of Morgantown, West Virginia, even offers incentives worth $12,000 through the Ascend West Virginia program, paid out over two years. Memphis, Tennessee, reportedly pays up to $50,000 to anyone who moves to the largest city in the west of this southern state, which, not entirely without reason, has a questionable reputation. The same goes for Baltimore, whose decline is impossible to miss.

Ontario, Oregon, is the better deal: set in wonderful scenery, it offers a $10,000 grant toward buying a home, a good bargain given the fairly low property prices.

Countless towns now want to speed up their growth with payments that are sometimes very generous. The rural exodus of recent decades is slowly reversing: urban crime rates, skyrocketing rents and the shift to remote work are making big cities less and less attractive. The politicization of everyday life is also far less present in the countryside, and in some states it is even banned by law. While many conservatives no longer feel at home in the cities, rural communities increasingly offer them a "normal" life far away from climate kids, tax hikes, feminist theory in elementary school and a woke culture of bans. Life in small town USA may not be more exciting than life in the European countryside, it's just more "normal".

Compare six different US visa options for freelancers and the self-employed here.

In short

• About a fifth of the US population lives in rural areas, and around 80 percent of Americans live in urban areas.
• Since remote work became common in many office jobs, lots of Americans are moving back to the countryside.
• Towns like Jasper in Indiana, Curtis in Nebraska and Bloomfield in Iowa attract newcomers with cash, land or grants.
• In the countryside, many conservatives find a life they call more "normal".

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