The issues of rural communities are not limited to America:
Quote:
The gilets jaunes . . . are drawn from commuters who reside in suburban and rural areas, where household incomes are lower and housing tends to be more affordable. They are more sensitive to fuel prices because they need to drive to jobs located in or near cities.
Rural areas have also been hardest hit by the rise in e-commerce and by big-box retailers that have gutted many villages that once served as centers of commerce and social life in the countryside.
“It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back,” said Kevin Meyer, a 24-year-old gilet jaune who commutes to work at a textile factory from his small village, Montferrier, at the foot of the Pyrénées in southwestern France. “Life in rural areas is already difficult. There’s little work and all the shops are closing” . . . .
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https://www.wsj.com/articles/yellow-...article_inline
I suspect a lot of the idyllic villages of southern Europe are kept alive by retirees, many of them American, these days.