The depopulation of rural Iowa is now a problem for the National Guard.
In the adjutant general’s “Condition of the Guard” message to the Iowa Legislature earlier this month, he said: “I can’t continue to have quality infrastructure where I’m pouring tax dollars from federal and state funds into a facility that I can’t keep manned because I can’t recruit from the local area because the pool of people just doesn’t exist.”
While much of rural Iowa keeps getting emptier, Salt Lake City and Las Vegas keep getting fuller. Utah, which squeaked ahead of Iowa in the 2018 census estimates, is continuing a rapid trajectory upward. It was the fastest-growing state of the decade. The 2019 estimate for Nevada is higher than Iowa’s 2010 population, and with one pro-sports franchise activated and another one on the way, the only competition Iowa can provide is … gambling on those sporting events (with a pittance for a taxpayer take).
Iowa’s population only rose by about 109,000 in the decade — or slightly more people than North Carolina added in fiscal 2019 alone.
The caucus and football seasons inadvertently provide three examples of population bleed:
- U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell of California, temporarily a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, left as a child in the 1980s (not as part of the farm crisis, but because his dad was fired).
- U.S. Rep. Katie Porter, another California Democrat, was born in Fort Dodge, taught for a while at the University of Iowa, and then, like so many other Iowans, moved west for good.
- Heisman Trophy winner Joe Burrow was born in Ames, technically the third Heisman winner born in this state. But he left when he was 4, because his dad (a football assistant coach) took a job in southeast Ohio.
Since 1970, Iowa has lost three seats in Congress (1973, 1993, 2013) and California has gained 15. It may be easier to be a representative “from” Iowa than to be a representative from Iowa.