What do all the people do (for work) in rural area towns and unincorporated areas?
Drove hundreds of miles through some very rural New England, USA today. Most areas were very nice with well kept homes and cute, small city centers (mostly only a couple of brick, commercial buildings).
What do people do for jobs out in the "middle of nowhere"? As an engineer who works closer to city areas where more jobs exist, I just can't fathom what people are doing for jobs out there? How is everything paid for?
Edit: I should clarify there's minimal farm land out in rural New England. So, not very many farmers at all.
A lot of people don't work (retired, married a bread winner, or students living off mom and dad).
And there are of course telecommuting jobs now.
And even rural areas have doctors, dentists, plumbers, electricians, gas stations, delivery services, daycare, schools, libraries, churches, post offices, and countless other "invisible" employers that are easy to forget about when you live in a metropolitan city with dozens or hundreds of major corporate employers.
Truckers generally are more of a suburb and outskirts thing. Mostly because you still need to get to the distribution centers to pick up cargo.
I could imagine a few truly independent truckers (own their own rig) who live in the middle of nowhere between seasons. But they likely are also smart enough to not want to risk their truck breaking down way the hell away from anything that can help them.
That said, other seasonal workers like people who work on oil rigs or fly out to do basically every Alaska based job that the Discovery Channel lives off of can potentially live in the absolute middle of nowhere. But... most of them likely want a place to spend their cash if you catch my drift.