Were people fooled into going to the cities?

As late as the Great Depression, an era in which my mother grew up, many people, including herself, lived on a farm.  She said on several occasions, that they didn't even know that there was a depression going on.  That's because the farm provided all their needs.  They didn't need money, or that much money, on which to live.

But then there was war, and people dispersed from the farms to the cities.  Now, the question is this:  why did people leave their farms, which was a source of security; for the cities, which have proven not to be?

My grandparents left their farm and moved to the big city.  It is impossible to ask now, since they are gone, but I suspect that they left because they were too old to work the farm by themselves.  The children all left for the cities.  So, they followed their kids into the big cities, and that's where they are buried today---right here in Houston.

What was in the cities that wasn't in the countryside?  Probably the lure of money and what money will buy.  It may have seemed to be a good move at the time.  The post war economy produced plenty of good paying jobs.  You could make a good life in the city.  But things started to change in the sixties.  The crime rate soared.  The economy began to stagnate.  Now, after all of that, those who were born and raised on the farm were now out of luck.  Or perhaps their children were, or their grandchildren.

Now, I kinda wish that my grandparents had stayed put.  If they had, perhaps a respect for the life in the country could have made it on down to me a bit sooner.  All these years I spent pursuing that dream of making a bundle at something.  It was never necessary.  If only I'd have seen this as an option a lot sooner.

My father wanted to live off the land.  How many times did he say it before he died?  If given the opportunity to work a farm, I'm sure he would have taken it, and the family along with it.

The decision to come to the cities was a mistake.  How often did that mistake get made?  Can you generalize this to the public as a whole?  One thing is certain, a large number of people left the farms from the time of the Depression until recent times.  They could have been fooled by the false promises of money.  Now, they have no land, and may have to depend upon others for their sustenance.

When politicians talk about the economy, can they really point to a development like this and call it a success?  For that is what the New Deal did.  It failed to solve a problem, which was the money-centered economy, and created a bigger one in its place.  They took a small number of people who couldn't find jobs and now have created a bigger number that cannot find jobs.  What do the people do when the money's no good anymore?  That's what happens when politicians interfere in something they don't understand.  Big government is a failure.