Jon Doolittle recalled when he decided to leave the Northeast (where he was attending Harvard University) and return to the Midwest. “There was one day my junior year of college, when I noticed myself racing for a subway car in Boston, nudging my shoulder in front of other people in the crowd to get a seat,” he said. “I didn’t knock anyone over or anything, but I really took notice. I was caught up in the rat race and I didn’t want to be a part of that.” 

The St. Joseph News-Press' Clinton Thomas reported over the weekend about Missouri's "brain drain." The Census Bureau has found that young, college-educated people are leaving the Great Plains and the Rust Belt "to establish their careers on the coasts or in the Southeast." The local Chamber of Commerce in St. Joe, Missouri, has tried to track recent high school graduates, but has had trouble doing surveys. Meanwhile, the kids who have left northwest Missouri still think about returning, even as their careers take them to London and Beijing.

In comments attached to the story, WhoisJohnGalt writes: "Perhaps it is a good thing. Transplanting midwest values to the coasts might be a good thing for the populations there. A dose of common sense so to speak. :)"

Some small towns are thinking of just going away, according to the Wall Street Journal. They are considering disincorporation. It's rare — the last town to dissolve itself in Washington State was Elberton in 1965; in California, the last town to disincorporate was Cabazon in 1972 — but the tough economy is leading some to consider municipal suicide, at least according to the Journal. (The WSJ site is subscription only; the story is here.) 

Mesa, Washington (map above) is a town of 500 people 250 miles east of Portland that has begun talks with the county about disincorporating. Rio Vista and Vallejo in California are also saying they may need to dissolve in order to solve some financial difficulties. (Vallejo filed for bankruptcy last year.) The Journal reports that most towns can't simply disincorporate in order to avoid financial difficulties. 

Meanwhile, some citizens of Spokane Valley, Washington, want to disincorporate their 90,000 city in a populist uprising spurred by rising taxes. "Too many people are hurting from how bad the economy is doing," said one member of the group wanting to dissolve Spokane Valley. "We just can't put up anymore with what the government wants."

Verizon sheds its rural phone lines even as the Yonder 40 stock index outshines its big city rivals.

Nearly half of rural families that receive an Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) will get an increase in the benefit because of the federal economic stimulus act. A slightly higher percentage of metropolitan EITC recipients will get more money from the benefit this year.

A study by Marybeth J. Mattingly at the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire found that of rural families that receive the EITC, 43 percent will get an increase in the size of their tax credit. For suburban families that are eligible for EITC, 45 percent will get an increase, while 47 percent of EITC recipients in the central-city will get an increase.

The average increase in EITC will also be a little higher for suburban and urban families. The average increased benefit for rural families will be $115, while the increase for suburban families is $147 and central city families $178. The amount of the tax credit is based on a variety of factors such as the number of children in a family, the size of family income, and the number of earners in a household.

Changes in the EITC program that were included in the stimulus package (officially known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) will add $3.4 billion to the incomes of poor working families through the EITC program. Of that amount, the report estimates that $566 million will go to rural families. Nationally 34 percent of U.S. families qualify for the benefit, while 39 percent of rural families do.