2023-09-06 07:00:00
A new study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas says the Lone Star State is keeping more of its population than any other state in the country, thanks to its economic health.
According to the Dallas Fed, as of 2021, Texas has around 82% of its residents still living in the state.
Researchers said they used American Community Survey data to determine the share of people born in each state who still lived in that state as of the 2021 survey.
“The share of people born in a state and who stay there can provide an important measure of its attractiveness to workers,” the researchers said in a released statement.
“The stickiness of native residents is also key to maintaining a stable (or growing) population and workforce, which is vital to economic growth.”
Other “sticky” states include California, Utah, Georgia, and Utah. North Carolina ranks second behind Texas with 75.5 % of its population remaining in the state. Georgia comes third with 74.2%, California has 73%, and Utah falls last with 72.9%.
Less sticky states include North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Rhode Island, and Alaska. The study said Wyoming is the least stickiest with only 45.2% of its natives remaining there.
North Dakota (48.6%) and Alaska (48.7%) are the only states with less than half of their population staying there, according to researchers. Rhode Island and South Dakota have 55.2% and 54.2%, respectively.
Dallas Fed said several factors went into making states stickier than others, including better and more varied job opportunities, above-average job growth, less burdensome tax policies, and housing costs (though California was a noted exception), having multiple cities within the state, and state size (which could mean higher relocation costs for those moving out).
“Interestingly, the pandemic didn’t affect stickiness scores much,” said Fed.
“We find no state’s stickiness score changed by more than three percentage points between 2017 and 2021. Even as more people moved during the pandemic, states overall remained just as sticky (or not) as they were before.”
This study was reported by Ana Pranger, research analyst at the Dallas Fed; Pia Orrenius, senior economist and vice president in the Dallas Fed research department; and Madeline Zavodny, professor of economics at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville, Fla.
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