Tim Slack

Examines social, economic, and demographic changes that are reshaping rural America. Focuses on the central idea that rural America is no paragon of stability. Social change abounds, accompanied by new challenges. Analyses empirical evidence, demographic data, and policy debates to provide insights about rural America and the United States as a whole.

Uses data from the Resilient Children, Youth, and Communities study—a longitudinal cohort survey of households with children in DHOS-affected areas of South Louisiana—to consider the effect of DHOS exposure on health trajectories of children, an especially vulnerable population subgroup.

Assembles a group of papers focused squarely on the changing demography of rural and small-town America in the early twenty-first century that address issues of broad interest to demographers: population growth and decline, fertility, mortality, migration, ethnoracial composition, and economic inequality.

Assesses whether and how inequalities in underemployment between metropolitan (metro) and nonmetropolitan (nonmetro) areas have changed over the course of the last five decades. Draws on data from the March Current Population Survey (CPS) from 1968 to 2017 to analyze inequality in the prevalence of underemployment between metro and nonmetro areas of the United States, paying special attention to differences between white, black, and Hispanic workers.

Analyzes data from the first-ever national-level study of informal work in the USA to test two prominent points of focus in the literature: how participation in informal work relates to social embeddedness and formal labor supply. Also provides a comparative test of the factors associated with exchange-based informal work (i.e., money/barter) vs. self-provisioning activities.

Shows that places where the signature characteristics of the Great Recession were most pronounced (i.e., home foreclosures and unemployment) were precisely the places where SNAP caseloads jumped most, not places with historically high levels of SNAP participation.

Shows that the high economic distress that has long characterized Appalachia, the Borderland, and the Delta translates into greater reliance on the FSP relative to other areas of the country, net of other local and state-level characteristics.

Shows how working poverty has persistently had a disproportionate impact on rural families over a 25 year period, but that there is also a trend toward residential convergence as working poverty in metropolitan areas has climbed toward the levels experienced in rural areas.

Shows clear disadvantages for older workers relative to their middle-aged counterparts in terms of the likelihood of underemployment, and particular disadvantages for older rural residents and women.

Shows the prevalence of underemployment is decidedly higher among first-generation immigrants compared to those who are second generation or higher. These gross comparisons, however, mask important variation within immigrant generations, including a particular disadvantage for foreign-born non-citizens.