An Alarming Number of People Are Fleeing New York State
New year, new state to call home? For many living in New York, this will certainly be a reality in 2019.
It comes as no surprise to anyone who lives here that New York State isn’t exactly the most financially friendly state. The cost of living, even for those making a comfortable wage, can feel suffocating. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo insists that people are leaving the state, not so much because of job loss and high taxes, but instead for reasons such as not liking the weather. However, it seems a bit far stretched that 48,510 people would pack up their lives and move away because they're not fans of the weather in New York, weather that has actually been on the mild side for the last several years.
48,510 is the estimated number of people who left the state of New York between July 1, 2017, and July 1, 2018. You could say that our state is the winner. The winner of having the most people leave. Coming in just behind us is the state of Illinois. Illinois saw 45,116 people leave from July of 3017 to July of 2018. Rounding out the top nine states with the biggest decline in population are West Virginia, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi, Alaska, Connecticut, and Wyoming. Each of these states saw a combined loss of 33,661 people, according to the United States Census Bureau.
UPI reports that Sandra Johnson, a demographer at the Census Bureau said in a statement, “If those states are not gaining from either domestic or international migration, they will experience either low population growth or outright decline."
While the population in the state of New York is on the sharp decline, the state still has the fourth highest population rate with 19.4 million people. California, Texas, and Florida have the top three highest population rates.
So, what states are growing in population? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Nevada and Idaho are the winners with a population increase of 2.1 percent in both of the states.