Performing Department
Agricultural Economics & Rural
Non Technical Summary
The purpose of this project is to understand the effects of six forms of natural resource-related economic development on per capital income, poverty, and relative support for natural resource-related economic development in rural America. Community support for development is crucial for successful policy implementation. Thus this study evaluates the landscape and drivers of relative support -- meaning support for one form of development in relation to at least one or more additional forms of development -- for six common forms of rural natural resource development. The study will take place through four objectives/tasks: (1) conduct a national survey of rural residents' relative support for various forms of development; (2) model the impact of six forms of natural resource use and development on county-level per capita income and poverty from 1990-2016; (3) link the historic county-level data to individual-level relative supportin a multi-level analysis of stated preference grounded in social exchange theory; (4) integrate quantitative analyses with comparative qualitative case-studies on four high poverty rural counties with different types of natural resource dependence. This project addresses USDA Strategic Goal 4, Facilitate Rural Prosperity and Economic Development, by providing actionable evidence to promote rural economic development and prosperity, enhance quality of life, and alleviate poverty. This project will inform future policy by improving national understanding of the impacts of six common forms of natural resource use on rural economic development, as well as the levels and drivers of present-daysupport for future natural resource development.
Animal Health Component
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Research Effort Categories
Basic
100%
Applied
0%
Developmental
0%
Goals / Objectives
The overall goal of this project is to understand the effect of six forms of natural resource-related economic development on per capita income, poverty, and relative support for natural resource-related economic development in rural America. Building on findings from a recently-completed pilot study, and using the theoretical framework of social exchange (Emerson 1976), we hypothesize that the driving factors of relative support (one form in relation to another) will be different than the driving factors of general support (support for a single form of development) (Mueller & Tickamyer 2019). In doing so, we aim to inform multiple stakeholders of the broader landscape of both the economic impacts of development, as well as rural resident perspectives on natural resource-related economic and community development. To achieve this goal, we will address four specific objectives over a three-year project period.Objective 1 (Year 1): Collect quantitative primary data on rural residents' perspectives, beliefs, and relative support for six forms of natural resource development in non-metro U.S. counties. With support from the Penn State Survey Research Center, we will conduct a representative national survey of a random sample of households in non-metropolitan counties throughout the continental United States. The survey will assess support for six major forms of natural resource-related development common across rural America, as well as their associated perceived impacts, power dynamics, and trust expressed by residents: oil and gas, commercial logging, mining, wind energy, tourism, and real estate. The survey will also assess additional likely drivers of support such as industrial history, community identity, political ideology, place attachment, economic outlook, perceived resource dependence, and socio-demographic factors. The survey will be based upon a 2018 pilot study of rural Pennsylvanians that tested the instrument, funded by the Penn State Social Science Research Institute (Mueller & Tickamyer 2019).Objective 2 (Year 1): Estimate the effect of natural resource use and dependence on per capita income and poverty in non-metro counties throughout the United States from 1990 to 2016. In order to ground our study in the documented impact of each form of development, we will perform a statistical analysis of the relationship of each form of development with both per capita income to residents and poverty. We will estimate models of both per capita income and poverty to ensure we consider the impacts of development on both changes in income, and the distribution of those changes. We will compile data from 1990-2016 for all non-metro United States counties, and produce estimates of the level of natural resource development captured by employment shares in the six forms of natural resource use identified in Objective 1. We will also collate data on per capita income and poverty rates. Additional relevant demographic control variables will be extracted and compiled. Drawing on a recently completed pilot project, these data will then be analyzed using spatial panel fixed effects models to determine the effect of natural resource use and dependence on economic outcomes in non-metro U.S. counties over the study period. This form of modeling allows for the precise estimation of within-county effects while controlling for both spillover effects and unobserved county heterogeneity. The dependent variables of this objective will be per capita income and the poverty rate. The independent variables will be the level of natural resource development (i.e. employment share) in each form of development. Time-variant control variables expected to influence both independent and dependent variables (e.g. confounders) will be included to ensure proper inference.Objective 3 (Year 1-3): Analyze the drivers of relative support for natural resource-related economic development in the non-metro counties in the United States. Using the data collected from both the primary data collection effort of Objective 1, and the secondary data collection of Objective 2, we will develop statistical models to analyze the drivers of general and relative support at the individual level. We will estimate statistical models of respondents' stated top preference for future development. These models will build on recently conducted pilot analyses (Mueller & Tickamyer 2019) using primary survey data on perceived impacts, industry trust, and industry power to model top development preferences by including county-level employment shares for each of the six forms of development. This approach will allow for a more holistic assessment of the effect of longitudinal exchange relationships theorized by social exchange theory (Emerson 1976) than is currently available in the literature.Objective 4 (Year 2-3): Conduct a comparative case study to triangulate understanding of the views among community members and stakeholders surrounding natural resource related-economic development. Building on recent work developing a typology of natural resource dependence conducted by members of the study team and results from objective 2, we will select four case study counties in high-poverty areas of the United States that are dependent on different forms of natural resource use: 1) extractive, 2) non-extractive, 3) hybrid (both extractive and non-extractive), and 4) non-dependent. These counties will form the basis of a qualitative comparative case study of the relationship between different forms of natural resource dependence and support for future development. The primary goal of this objective is to develop an understanding of the experiences and viewpoints of community members and stakeholders in poor rural areas dependent upon various forms of natural resource-related economic development. The methods used will include semi-structured interviews with key informants and local residents, a discourse analysis of local newspapers, and archival analyses. Particular care will be taken to ensure that the voices of non-landowning, and traditionally marginalized groups such as women and ethnic/racial minorities are heard. The methodology of the case studies is based upon a spring 2018 pilot study performed in Clarion County, PA in conjunction with the pilot survey.
Project Methods
A summary of methods associated with each objective of the project include the followIng.Objective 1: Collect quantitative primary data on rural residents' perspectives, beliefs, and relative support for six forms of natural resource development in non-metro U.S. counties.Asurvey to measure relative support for six forms of natural resource-related economic development: oil and gas, commercial logging, mining, wind energy, tourism, and real estate will be constructed based on a previously conducted pilot study. The key measures of the instrument will be a repeated battery of perceived impacts,A sample of 7,000 continental United States households will be produced and drawn by the Penn State Survey Research Center. High poverty counties, operationalized as counties with a poverty level at or above 1.5 times the 2016 national average of 12.7%, or 19.1% will be oversampled.Objective 2: Estimate the effect of natural resource use and dependence on per capita income and poverty in non-metro counties throughout the United States from 1990 to 2016. We will assemble a county-level dataset that includes the level of each form of natural resource development, poverty, and other demographic characteristics, from 1990 to 2016. The specific years of analysis will be 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2016. These data will be drawn from four main sources: Unsuppressed Census Bureau County Business Patterns data from Economic Modeling LLC (EMSI), the Decennial Census, the American Community Survey (ACS), and the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) Local Area Personal Income and Employment data.Objective 3: Analyze the drivers of relative support for natural resource-related economic development in the non-metro counties in the United States. We will utilize a multi-level approach to evaluate the drivers of relative support for each form of natural resource-related development. This entails combiningthe mail-back survey and the county level database into a master database containing individual and ecological data. We will merge the individual-level primary dataset and the county-level secondary dataset, which will allow us to account for contextual and individual-level determinants of relative support. Then using both individual and county level predictors, we will estimate a model predicting the primary drivers of relative support for natural resource-related development.Objective 4 (Year 2-3): Conduct a comparative case study to triangulate understanding of the views among community members and stakeholders surrounding natural resource related-economic development. To add further depth to our project, we will conduct a comparative case study (Grandy 2010) of four high-poverty counties with differing histories of natural resource use selected from a typology of dependence the research team has recently created. The use of multiple methods - semi-structured interviews, discourse analysis, and historical analysis - will facilitate triangulation of the research findings. The purpose of this objective is to answer the primary research question - what are the experiences of community members and stakeholders living within different forms of natural resource dependence, and how have those experiences affected their support for future development?(Note: Muchgreater detail on each of procedures and analytic techniques to be followed for each steps is provided in the original proposal.)