Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

The current state of many rural communities demands new, more relevant economic development strategies. Traditional models of rural economic development often rely on farming, natural resource extraction, and industrial type jobs that rely on lower cost labor usually focused on manufacturing of product or food. Farm jobs declined decades ago. Offshoring, and more recently automation is rapidly reducing the number of jobs available in rural areas. Jobs and economic vitality are critical to sustaining or growing communities. While traditional methods of industry attraction are still viable strategies to spur economic activity, rural areas must develop concurrent economic strategies driven by entrepreneurship and a pivot to the modern, digital economy. The purpose of this quantitative study is to examine factors associated with entrepreneurship and digital talent in the rural Heartland states of Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, and Oklahoma. Using data largely available to the public, measures of association such as Pearson’s product moment correlations and regression analysis were used to identify variables that are relevant or predictive of entrepreneurship and digital talent in the rural Heartland.

Keywords: rural entrepreneurship, digital economy, digital talent, economic development, Heartland, Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma

Year manuscript completed

2021

Year degree awarded

2021

Author's Keywords

rural entrepreneurship, digital economy, digital talent, economic development, Heartland, Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma

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Dissertation Committee Chair

Justin Brogan

Committee Member

Randal Wilson

Committee Member

Chris Wooldridge

Document Type

Dissertation

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