>We've come a long way since Jefferson, Adams, and Madison opined that cities were "the natural enemies of virtue and happiness." While I don't want to go back to a world where more than 50% of the population is solely bound to food production, I do feel like we're losing something. The real tension in the US, rural vs urban (not red vs blue), just continues to grow worse. I don't know what the solution is, but I do know that robust systems usually avoid centralization, favoring variety and redundancy instead.
One of the big issues (at least AFAICT) is the lack of good paying jobs in reasonable proximity to rural areas.
Why is that? Among other things, one issue seems to be a lack of specific kinds of infrastructure in rural areas: High-speed rail and high-speed internet connectivity.
High-speed rail with hubs in urban (or urban-adjacent) areas can provide reasonable access for folks to commute to where the jobs are.
High-speed internet connectivity would allow for (some) businesses to start and thrive in rural areas.
Improving such infrastructure in rural areas would encourage (at least for a while), urban/suburban dwellers to move to more rural areas without compromising their earnings ability.
And if such a migration is made possible/desirable, other businesses supporting those new residents (apartment buildings, bars/restaurants, cultural activities and a raft of other opportunities will present themselves for other, local, businesses.
Would moving stuff like this be easy? No. There are a whole bunch of issues that block creating such infrastructure and the business environment that would depend upon such infrastructure.
That said, urban/suburban folks moving to a functional (in terms of access and services) rural areas will increase the incentives for other businesses (hospitals, anyone?) to come to, remain and/or expand in rural areas.
This would reduce some of the pressure on housing prices in urban/suburban areas and revitalize the economies of rural areas.
I don't expect to see such movement in the near to medium term, and more's the pity. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't advocate for such things.
Edit: Fixed typo.