Rural flight (or rural exodus) is the migratory patterns of peoples from rural areas into urban areas.
In modern times, it often occurs in a region following the industrialization of agriculture when fewer people are needed to bring the same amount of agricultural output to market and related agricultural services and industries are consolidated. Rural flight is exacerbated when the population decline leads to the loss of rural services such as stores and schools, which leads to greater loss of population as people leave to seek those features.
This phenomenon was first articulated through Ravenstein's Laws of migration in the 1880s, upon which modern theories are based.
Read more about Rural Flight: In The United States and Canada, Contemporary Developing Countries
Famous quotes containing the words rural and/or flight:
“Some bring a capon, some a rural cake,
Some nuts, some apples; some that think they make
The better cheeses bring ‘em, or else send
By their ripe daughters, whom they would commend
This way to husbands, and whose baskets bear
An emblem of themselves in plum or pear.”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)
“Here I am.... You get the parts of me you like and also the parts that make you uncomfortable. You have to understand that other people’s comfort is no longer my job. I am no longer a flight attendant.”
—Patricia Ireland (b. 1935)