Rural young people in today's Russia have the ability to contribute to Russia's development, but conditions in the Russian countryside do not provide opportunities for them to do so. Potentially, rural young people represent an innovative resource of social, economic, and cultural development, a vital factor of the material and intellectual renovation of the Russian countryside. To a large extent, the sociocultural characteristics of the rising generation (values, attitudes in life, professional interests) determine the parameters of the reproduction of rural society and the further development of rural territories in Russia. In this article, the author looks at the "innovative potential" of rural young people as "the degree of their readiness" to carry out the tasks necessary to ensure the achievement of innovative goals, as their ability to serve as an active agent of social and economic transformations, first and foremost in the countryside. Based on an analysis of a number of social and pedagogical studies, the author has created a "generalized social portrait" of young people in the countryside. Contrary to common opinion, today's rural youth are well provided with knowledge; they are decisive in their pursuit of the creation of personal capital, and this means they are able to engage in activity on their own. Today's rural young people have to rely primarily on themselves and their parents.