Two questions about the heartland

Why are your counties so small? I'll assume that the answer is historical.

Now that your population is collapsing, why don't you save some money by combining a few of them? Is government patronage (that is, the Bureaucracy) the only source of jobs left? Don't tell me a single sheriff's department can't patrol a New Jersy sized county; we do it all the time in the West. Is it local pride by the last thirty people in the county seat, or are you just too conservative to make a change that might actually lower your taxes? Is it easier to complain about jhypothetical federal government spending, than to lower real local government spending?

As a third bonus question, have you ever noticed that people are almost universally in favor of "reducing the bureaucracy," less fond of "eliminating government services" that they use, and positively opposed to laying off "civil service employees" who are friends or relatives?