Unless you can work remotely the main reason to move to urban areas is for jobs. There are next to no high paying jobs in rural America unless you start your own business.

Factor in housing costs and in some cases making less in a smaller city or rural area in fact pays you far more. Housing in high cost of living cities is pretty ludicrous, especially if you ever want to buy.

That and I'm not just talking about rural areas. There are dozens of medium sized cities with fairly affordable housing, especially in the Midwest. Texas isn't bad either if you stay away from tech exodus hotspots and trendy/posh areas.

Try just doing a nationwide job search with salaries adjusted for housing cost.

This remains to be seen. Most of these communities have either no jobs or one primary employer are are very subject to disruption. When you're laid off and your house becomes worthless because the biggest employer in town is shutting down, what are you left with?

It also limits your mobility dramatically. By working in a HCOL city, even if I'm struggling to save, I'm maxing out my 401(k) plus match and more every year. If I want, I can do that for a while and then move to somewhere cheaper. My family in the midwest, despite saving enough for an incredibly comfortable retirement there, couldn't purchase a home anywhere within 1.5 hours of Seattle if they wanted to move there now.

Most medium-sized cities have either no jobs or only one primary employer? I want to see your data to back up that claim, because it sounds like you're just making stuff up to argue.

Rural areas, small towns, and small cities maybe. Medium sized cities usually have several large employers and many dozens of smaller ones at least.

Medium sized would be places like Indianapolis, Columbus, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Orlando, Phoenix, etc. Austin used to be high on that list before it got inflated.

You consider Phoenix, the fifth most populated city in the country, to be "medium sized"?

A lot of small town America can lean heavily to the right unless it’s a college town and it’s not what a lot of young people are looking for. This is probably more acceptable once you’ve settled down with a family but still isn’t great especially if you’re a different ethnicity or have non normative sexual preferences.

You also have to be a specific kind of person (like me) that wants to do outdoorsy things to live outside the major cities.

Are you unfamiliar with the oil and gas industry? Many of those jobs pay pretty well, and much of the work is out in rural areas.

As for starting your own business, why not? There's plenty of demand for welding services right now.

there are lots of job concentrations with affordable costs of living. They're just not hip. One example off the top of my head is suburban DFW. It may not be cool enough for you but you can get a pretty good tech job and afford a house there.