They found no evidence that conservation lands lead to drastic employment declines or to economic growth. The results suggest that economic development impacts should not be the primary factor in decisions about establishing new conservation areas such as national forests or parks, the authors conclude. Conservation lands include areas such as national and state forests, wildlife refuges and national and state parks. Among the seven states in the study, Maine has the smallest portion of its area in conservation at 5.4 percent, and Michigan and Minnesota have the largest at 37 percent and 33.3 percent respectively. Altogether, state governments own about six out of every ten of these acres.
Federal ownership accounts for the rest.
That allows us to see if conservation land has an effect on migration to a county or the number of jobs. Some counties in the study area have no conservation land while others include as much as 50 percent of their land under such management. Lewis and Plantinga used data from U.S. Census reports and created a mathematical model to estimate the relative importance of conservation lands as a factor in population changes and job growth. Their model also considers social and economic factors that could affect rural economic performance. Among them were unemployment, family income, education levels, recreational opportunities and public expenditures on education, police and medical needs.