California Population Loss Slows, State Loses Only 32,000 Between July 2022 and July 2023

The California Department of Finance announced on Tuesday that California’s overall population loss slowed down dramatically during the 2022-2023 fiscal year, with the state population going down by only 37,200 people between July 2022 and July 2023.

According to the 2020 U.S. Census, California’s population that year was at roughly 39.5 million. However, due in part to high taxes, a high cost of living, crime issues, the decline of the tech industry, an increase of work from home positions, and the COVID-19 pandemic freeing up many people to go into a position to more easily move, California’s population decreased dramatically in the next several years. Hundreds of thousands of people left the state. At the same time, immigration was largely curbed by the pandemic, with fewer families choosing to start families during the same time. As a result, even with inter-state immigration, California continued to lose people. By July 2022, the state had just over 39.1 million people, with the greatest losses coming from the Bay area of the state. In 2022 alone, over 800,000 people had left to go to other states.

However, in the last fiscal year, population losses in California have begun to shore up once again. A rebounding birth rate, immigration into California reaching pre-pandemic levels, and less people leaving the state compared to other years turned things around. Other smaller factors, such as companies cancelling out-of-California moves, like Disney’s failed Lake Nona venture in Florida, and some residents moving back after finding that they didn’t like the state they moved to led to many staying in California as a result in the past year.

“The decline in California’s population continued to slow during the past fiscal year, reaching 39.11 million as of July 1st, according to official estimates released today,” said the California Department of Finance on Tuesday. “The 0.1-percent decline of 37,200 since July 1, 2022 is a fraction of the 295,000 decline (-0.75 percent) during the first full fiscal year of COVID-19 In 2020-2021. In 2022-23, that decline dropped by more than half to 100,428 (-0.26 percent). Above-average deaths have continued to decline from their 2021 peak, while immigration levels have largely recovered since the end of stringent federal rules imposed early in the COVID-19 response.”

“Leading factors contributing to population trends in the past fiscal year include:
• Natural increase –the difference between the number of births and deaths — added 107,300 people from 2022 to 2023 with 409,200 births, and 301,900 deaths. Births were down from 423,400 in the year ending July 1, 2022, while deaths were down from 318,500.
• After two consecutive years of decline, foreign immigration recovered to pre-pandemic levels, with a net gain of 115,900 in 2022-2023.
• Domestic out-migration continued its decline in 2022-23 at 260,400 people – dropping from 361,270 in 2020-21 and 295,578 in 2021-22.”

California stays above the 39 million population mark

While many of the bigger reasons for moving out of state still exist in California, experts told the Globe that net losses in population would likely end in the next few years.

“A big trend we have been noticing is that few companies are offering remote work,” explained Catherine Constantine, an interstate job placement specialist, to the Globe. “And many that do want people nearby offices so that they can come in, or do that as sort of a hybrid situation. And California has a lot of those types of jobs, so people who moved out are now coming back, especially from Texas.”

“Politics is part of it too. A lot of people are going to California because of the policies there, and, of course, the weather. But take a look at those numbers, more people are still moving out than moving in, so overall it is not exactly what you would call a recovery, but the situation is getting better overall in that regard.”

“What we have been noticing in job placement regarding California recently is that people haven’t been saying things like “No jobs in San Francisco” or “Don’t put me in San Diego.”. They’ve been saying “Is it safe to go back there yet?” or “With taxes, would I make more money in California than in Nevada?”. People obviously want to go to California. There is a huge appeal to it still. But there are still holdups for some people, especially some of the more liberal political decisions and taxes and cost of living. But with this new population study, it shows that there are fewer holdups now. Or, as in some cases, people are choosing their job and moving back over staying out of California and having to look for new work.”

Total 2023 populations figures are to come out early in 2024 with new Census data coming in.