Government-dependent counties derive most of their government earnings from State and local government jobs, although Federal jobs play a more important role than in all-nonmetro counties.
In 244 nonmetro counties, the primary economic specialization was Federal, State and local government activities. These counties are the sites for government-based activity associated with, among others, Federal, State, and local government offices, State institutions of higher education and health care, penal institutions, military bases, and headquarters for State and Federal parks and forests. County earnings from government jobs ranged from 25 to 77 percent of total earnings during 1987-89. For the group as a whole, earnings from government activities in 1989 accounted for 38 percent of total earnings, and earnings from trade/services activities accounted for an additional 38 percent.
Government-dependent counties, on average, derived approximately 75 percent of government earnings from State and local jobs and about 25 percent from Federal jobs. As might be expected, the reliance on Federal jobs relative to other government jobs was higher in government counties than in all-nonmetro counties, where only 17 percent of government earnings came from Federal activity. However, government activity in some counties was almost exclusively from Federal jobs and in other counties almost exclusively from State and local jobs.
Government counties are generally scattered across the Nation, with a slightly higher representation in the West, including most of Alaska (fig. 7). The West contains 15 percent of nonmetro counties but 27 percent of government counties. The government counties tended to be more highly urbanized, with one-fifth of the counties having between 20,000 and 50,000 people living in cities or towns, and 42 percent of the counties adjoining metro areas.
Government counties, along with the services-dependent counties, experienced the largest population growth (slightly over 6-percent increase) of any of the county economic types during the 1980's (table 4). Population increased in government counties in all regions, with the largest growth (11 percent) occurring in the western government counties.
Government counties also experienced strong economic growth during the 1980's (fig. 8). Aggregate earnings increased 11 percent, significantly higher than the 3.4-percent increase for all-nonmetro counties. Because earnings declined in all goods-producing sectors, the overall earnings growth in government counties stemmed from growth in the two largest sectors --government and trade/services. Government counties had a combined gain in government and
trade/services jobs in excess of 619,000 jobs with an offset from substantial losses in the goods-producing industries resulting in an overall gain of 433,000 new jobs.
Despite population and earnings growth, government counties had lower levels of economic well-being relative to all-nonmetro counties. Per capita income and per capita earnings averaged more than $1,000 lower than comparable all-nonmetro figures. The average poverty rate was the highest among the economic types. To a substantial extent, this results from the disproportionate number of low-income college students and military personnel in these counties. Nonetheless, the development of government-based activities, such as penal institutions, has revitalized the economies of some rural communities.
Table 4--Government-dependent counties:
Selected characteristics
Govern- All-
ment nonmetro
Item Unit counties counties
--------------------------- ------- ------- -------
Counties Number 244 2,276
Population, 1990 Thousands 6,571 50,898
Urbanized, 1993(1,2) Percent 70.9 66.0
Population density, 1990(3,4) Number 38.4 36.3
Population change, 1980-90(4) Percent 6.2 .6
Per capita income, 1989(4) Dollars 12,118 13,580
Earnings change, 1979-89:(5)
Total earnings Percent 11.0 3.4
Government earnings do. 21.9 18.5
(1) Persons living in towns of 2,500 population or more.
(2) Percentage of counties in group.
(3) Persons per square mile.
(4) Unweighted county averages.
(5) Calculated from aggregated data.
Go to: