I've lived in small towns, mostly, all of my life. I think small towns, for the mot part, are safer than big cities. But I've also known that when small town folk try to befriend you, it's because they just want to be up in your business. I also know, for the most part, in order to get a good job in a small town it boils down to: "Who you know and who you blow." Sad, but true.
In a small town, if you have any kind of education beyond high school, when you go to an interview, you are immediately viewed as suspicious, by the hiring person. They look at you as if you want their job, and from what I've observed, that would probably only be an improvement anyway.
Examples of small town interviews: You have a degree, and because the jobs in small towns are limited, you apply for a job at the local convenience store. They call you in for the interview and it goes like this: (Hiring person) "So you want to work here?" (Job seeker) "Yes, I would like to." (Hiring person) "You have a degree, why do you want to work here?" (Job seeker) "What do you mean?" (Hiring person) "Well you are educated, you are over qualified." {Truth is: There is NO such thing as 'over qualified' either you can do the damned job or you can't. {Truth is, if I am educated I can do that damned job.} (Job seeker) "Well jobs are rather limited here and I applied." {What the job seeker (Me anyway) would really like to say: "I want to work here because I have to pay for those frivolous things like food, clothing and shelter. Oh, by the way, are you telling me that you and the rest of the staff are stupid?" Hell they sure are implying it.
Truth is this: None of those jobs are exactly rocket science and America has simply become sellers for cheap, Chinese goods, created in a sweat shop by slaves. So stop acting like I've lived my entire life just waiting to be talked down to at this damned interview.
Yeah, I have a degree which means I know that 2+2 still equals 4. Got it? I realize (From an entire life of observation) small town folk have to spell their last names correctly to be accepted. Most of the jobs in a small town, I could bring in Joe Blow off the street and he could do your job just fine and dandy. In reality ( where few people seem to live anymore) hiring managers just do not want anyone who might make them look incompetent. Not realizing all the while, as soon as they opened their mouth, spewing dumb questions, they already oozed incompetence. Hell, a prime example of America's failed high school education system is this: One day the cash register failed to work right in a Walmart (Meaning it did not give the answers on a silver platter to the cashier as to how much change I got back.) So the cashier whipped out a hand held calculator and it took that clerk almost 45 minutes to figure out I got back a whopping 70 cents. Oh my!
Another good example is: Small towns sometimes have a college, you get a degree from said college, a job opens up at said college, you apply, only to find out they don't even like their own degrees enough to call you in for an interview. Also said small town college, you leave the area to get a job within your degree to find out no one has even heard of you, outside small town. The potential employer, in a bigger area, has to Google your name to see if you are even a real college. (This is from personal experience.)
Also example: You apply, after moving back to small town, for a Social Work job at one of the local nursing homes. You get called in for an interview and then they find out you were once a nurse aid at that same place, a few years before. They have realized you got married, changed your name, so you scored the interview. But (Here's the kicker) you once were a nurse aid so you still must be stupid in their book. When you go to the interview,and they had forgotten who you were, you get treated ( for the first time ever, with respect) when you were a nurse aid you were not treated with respect, although nurse aids are needed more than Social Workers, in my book. Also I've written a book about how awful traditional nursing homes really are. One person at the interview actually said: "I suppose you'll write about us?" Why would I when you already fit the category of 'traditional nursing homes suck'?
So while small towns might be safer, I'm retired now and could care less about a job in one, they also have major flaws. Most flaws are, they are too conservative, too tight knit and too provincial for their own good. It's why they fail to ever progress. While this is my opinion, it is based on personal experience living in Small Town USA.
