With a single phrase, the new mayor of New York City has given us a political Rorschach test.
“We will replace the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism,” Zohran Mamdani declared in his recent inaugural address.
Of course, what is frigid to some is brisk and refreshing to others. Likewise, Mamdani’s version of the “warmth of collectivism” may feel like the smothering embrace of government to someone else.
In one of the many ironies of politics, the mayor of New York who styles himself as a Democratic Socialist will provide guaranteed full employment for many conservative commentators in the years ahead.
Here’s another irony: While we think of collectivism as the workers’ paradise of the furthest parts of the political left, the best examples of collectivism in the United States are typically found in its most conservative communities.
I refer, of course, to volunteer fire departments and volunteer rescue squads.
The key difference is found in the first word: These are voluntary arrangements, not once imposed or even organized by government. There is no need for any rural government to create an Office of Mass Engagement, as Mamdani has done. Rural communities generally work along the lines laid out by the great philosopher Hank Williams Jr.: “A Country Boy Can Survive.”
Well, sort of. Old Dominion University, in its annual State of the Commonwealth report, recently detailed how rural localities in Virginia get most of their funding from the state and federal governments. That, of course, is the big exception to the notion of rural communities as go-it-alone places. We aren’t. We depend on funding from other parts of the state, whether we like to admit it or not. I dealt with those figures in an earlier column. Rural areas benefit from that form of collectivism.
I do not claim any expertise in what New York needs. If you believe in the conservative principles of federalism, then the concept of states as “laboratories of democracy” extends to cities, too. If Mamdani thinks of collectivism as a warm, inviting thing, then let him have at it for a while and see how that works out. If you’re convinced Mamdani is wrong, you’re about to get a spectacular example of why you’re right.
Instead, I’ll offer some observations from a rural perspective that the mayor may or may not find useful. Let’s acknowledge the obvious: What works in a rural area may not work in a major metro. A city of 8.5 million can’t rely on volunteer emergency service squads; insurance companies would go berserk. A rural area has no choice; professional firefighters and rescue squad personnel cost money, and rural areas often have little to tax, so if we want the fire truck or ambulance to come when we call 911, we’d better go to the annual fundraising spaghetti supper at the fire hall.
However, from a statistical basis (as opposed to a philosophical one), there is one key difference between rural areas and urban ones: Rural areas have higher rates of volunteerism, and not just for fire crews or rescue squad shifts.
There are multiple studies that support this. Some of you may find them a lot of academic mumbo-jumbo that just proves what we already know, but humor me. I don’t get many chances to use the phrase “linear regression,” and I don’t want to pass up the opportunity to use it today, especially when I can cite it to say some good things about rural communities.
Let’s start with some Census Bureau data, as compiled by USA Facts.
When we look at the state level, we see some dramatic variations. The state with the highest rate of volunteerism is Utah, where 46.6% of adults have formally volunteered. The state with the lowest rate is next door in Nevada — just 18.6%. Generally speaking, the states with the highest rates of volunteerism that aren’t Utah are in the Midwest — maybe “Midwest nice” really is a thing. Minnesota and Nebraska tie at 40.3%. More urban states generally have lower rates — New York comes in at 25.5%, California at 24.1%, Florida at 20.4%. Virginia is somewhere in the middle at 31.6%.
The rural/urban divide isn’t perfect, though: West Virginia comes in at just 23%, Alabama at 19.9%.
What drives these differences? It certainly doesn’t appear to be political; there’s no discernible blue state/red state pattern here.
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A study published last year by four researchers — three at the University of Georgia, one at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (a joint campus that’s since been separated) — delved into the reasons behind “The Rural/Urban Volunteering Divide.” If you’re into reading about Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition, a form of linear regression that seeks to examine the differences between two groups by using the “sum of differentials attributable to differing endowments and those attributable to differing coefficients and an unexplained portion of the differential,” then you’re invited to read the actual paper.
If not, I’ve done that reading for you. Here’s what it says:
There are some obvious reasons why rural areas might have more volunteerism. Rural areas tend to be older, and older people are more likely to volunteer than younger ones. People in rural areas also tend to know more of their neighbors, and that increases volunteerism. However, the report took all that into account and still found that rural areas have higher rates of volunteerism.
So what’s the key driver then?
The report turned up several key findings.
Income: The rural middle class is more likely to volunteer than the urban middle class
In urban areas, volunteerism corresponds more to income than it does in rural areas. In general, poor people tend not to volunteer, be they rural or urban. “Poor neighborhoods are socially detached from middle- and higher-income communities, which decreases individuals’ motivations, opportunities, and invitations to participate in voluntary activities,” the study says. “From a practical perspective, individuals living in communities with higher levels of development are less preoccupied with meeting immediate material needs and more willing to invest in cooperative behavior with no immediate return,” the report said.
Subtract the poor from the equation, though, and volunteerism in urban areas is related to income: The more money you have, the more likely you are to volunteer. In rural areas, affluence doesn’t make a difference: Everyone other than the poor generally volunteers at the same rate, which tends to be high.
Racial and ethnic diversity depresses volunteerism in urban areas but not in rural areas
Does diversity make us stronger or weaker? This report suggests the answer depends on where we live. The more homogeneous, and less diverse, a city is, the more people are likely to volunteer. Diversity, or the lack thereof, had “no effect on the likelihood of rural volunteering,” the report found. This might be because, since rural areas are smaller and generally less diverse, people are more likely to know people directly and look past racial or ethnic differences. Or, as the report says, “In rural communities, individuals may be more likely to meet randomly and know each other in multiple contexts.” In plainer language, the last time I was at the Dollar General in Fincastle, the customer ahead of me in line was a Black man whom I knew because he was an umpire when my son played high school baseball. Still, it’s fascinating when you overlay politics on all this: Diversity decreases volunteerism in urban, i.e., liberal areas, but not in rural, i.e., conservative ones.
If you find that controversial, just wait until you get to this one:
Religiosity increases volunteerism in rural areas but decreases it in urban areas
In some rural areas, churches of a particular denomination might handle certain nonprofit services for the entire community. Botetourt County, where I live, publishes a list of resources available in the county. In Fincastle, the Methodist church runs the clothes closet, and the Episcopal church runs the food pantry. As a matter of practicality, in rural communities, some parts of the social safety net are operated by faith groups. That’s a form of collectivism, but again, not one that’s initiated by or run by the government.
The report doesn’t explain why religious-based volunteerism is higher in rural areas, although I suspect it might simply be a matter of necessity. If churches didn’t do these things, who would? All the report says is that it’s “notable” how much religiosity is a driver in rural areas, while it’s not in urban ones. “If religiosity had as strong a positive effect on volunteering in urban places as it does in rural places, urban volunteering would increase by [9.6%],” the report says.
Again, why?
The authors of this report say only “in general, the endowments of place contribute to the rural volunteering advantage.”
Here’s how I’d boil that down, past all the linear regressions and the coefficients and the mean values: Rural areas simply have a greater sense of community. Collectivism happens naturally in rural areas because there’s a general understanding that we’re all in this together, and if we don’t do something, nobody else will.
Nobody calls it collectivism, either. We just call it being good neighbors, and we don’t need the government to tell us to do these things — although a county web page listing what’s available is nice.
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