How come rural flight counties don't merge?

[retromike22]

A lot of rural counties, especially in the "rural flight" corridor from North Dakota to northern Texas have very low population numbers. Why don't some of them merge together?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

In rural areas land is often just as important for county organization than population. Take Grant County, ND. It has a population of only about 2300 and actually originally split from Morton County in the early 20th century. Its population is down from a peak of over 10k in 1930. So why not just rejoin Morton County (which actually has a non-negligible population because of suburban Bismarck)? Well this would leave most of the county at least an hour's drive from the county seat. All rural fire and medical services would have to be handled by Mandan, right across the river from Bismarck. Also land and property taxes, handling of agriculture regulations, and all local county business over a very wide area would be handled by a county commission elected primarily near Bismarck. It's logical that the area that makes up Grant County should be handled via local government rather than an area with completely different interests.