It teaches people to live in a simple life and be satisfied with all they have got.
Anyway, I am not saying that village people are all happy. What I am trying to say is that the rural economic niche helps to lessen the hardship of the life of people. In the village, people do have “ social capital“, to use the term coined by the world bank, to maintain at least a minimum level of living standard. That is they can, at least, survive during the period of economic downturn.