At The Wall Street Journal Ruth Simon and Coulter Jones report:
The financial fabric of rural America is fraying. Even as lending revives around cities, it is drying up in small communities. In-person banking , crucial to many small businesses, is disappearing as banks consolidate and close rural branches. Bigger banks have been swallowing community banks and gravitating toward the business of making larger loans.
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Of America’s 1,980 rural counties, 625 don’t have a locally owned community bank—double the number in 1994, federal data show. At least 35 counties have no bank, while about 115 are now served by just one branch.
This trend accelerates economic death spirals.
Weak school systems have made many rural communities less attractive to employers, says Peter Skillern, executive director of Reinvestment Partners, a nonprofit based in Durham, N.C., that works with rural communities.
Dollar stores and big-box retailers drained customers from some local shops. The financial crisis left some residents with battered credit and collateral. Populations dropped as youth moved out.
These communities have been hurt by declines in the textile and furniture industries, consolidation in agriculture and decreased government support for tobacco. Average annual employment in North Carolina’s 80 rural counties fell 6% between 2007 and 2016, according to the Raleigh-based NC Rural Center, compared with a gain of 11% in its six urban counties.
