Rural Sociology Commons^™

Assessing The Rural-Urban Divide In A Red State, Joe Blankenau, Chuck Parker

Online Journal of Rural Research & Policy

This paper explores the rural-urban divide, as it exists within Nebraska, which is a state that is largely homogenous, primarily red, with a historically sizable rural population that is in decline in most counties.1 Using survey data of attitudes towards political and economic issues, and self-identified political ideology, two key questions are considered. Has there been change in the rural-urban divide in Nebraska as rural areas lose population? Second, does the rural-urban divide persist when controlling for party identification, age, and income in multivariate analyses? Bivariate results show that the rural-urban divide continues to be an important factor on several …