Despite numerous technological advances, remoteness within the United States has been increasingly associated with relatively slower economic growth. Using a spatial hedonic pricing approach, this paper assesses the relative importance of proximity to urban consumer amenities and production...

Throughout the second half of the 20th century, urbanization, new technologies, rapid labor-saving productivity growth in primary industries, and improved highways combined to create large-scale regions which are now functionally integrated at the rural-urban level. These forces have raised the...

The export base hypothesis is that a region’s growth is led by export demand, given perfectly elastic factor supplies. It is a rationale for “sector-based” rural development policies, and it is formalized by input-output models. But it is contested by modern trade, migration, and growth...

In the EU, building social capital and developing human capital are increasingly seen as key to development in rural areas. Social capital is fundamentally about human interrelationships and networks. Evaluation of policy initiatives to promote social capital needs to go beyond indicators of...

Effective rural development (RD) policy requires transparent goals, specific objectives, well-defined metrics to measure success, and rigorous evaluation to justify sound policy. Such evaluation can employ aggregate indicators of impact (a macro approach) and/or more disaggregated information (a...

The combination of less than perfectly mobile resources (human and other), pervasive urbanization trends with potentially significant (positive and negative) externalities, and an environment of fiscal restraint suggests the need for more effective rural development and policy. In contrast to...

Commuting ties between rural places of residence and urban places of employment are among the most visible forms of rural-urban integration. For some rural areas, access to urban employment is a key source of population retention and growth. However, this access varies considerably across rural...

Rural North America has undergone a major economic transformation over the past century due to labor-saving technological progress, reductions in transport costs, and rising household incomes. The results are greater rural economic diversity, selected rural population decline, increased...