r/dataisbeautiful • u/TA-MajestyPalm • 4d ago

OC [OC] Post-Pandemic Population Growth Trends, by US Metro Area (2022->2024)

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Graphic by me, created in Excel. All data from US Census here: https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/popest/2020s-total-metro-and-micro-statistical-areas.html

I've created similar graphics in the past, but usually from 2020-2024. This is not the best time frame as it combines the abnormal covid years with post pandemic movement.

This time frame (2022-2024) shows the most current and ongoing population trends of the last 2 years.

I also wanted to better categorize the cities into broad cultural regions vs the arbitrary geographic census regions.

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u/Worried-Ebb8051 4d ago

Love the regional categorization approach!

The Austin vs Miami contrast is striking - both "hot" markets but completely different trajectories. Austin's plateau might reflect the tech correction and remote work normalization, while Miami's continued growth suggests lifestyle migration is more durable than job-driven moves. The Southeast's dominance really reinforces the "no state income tax" migration theory. Would be interesting to see this correlated with housing affordability metrics.

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u/JD_Waterston 3d ago edited 3d ago

I agree that I’ve heard a lot of people discuss income taxes when choosing locations, whereas few discuss property or sales taxes.

To be clear, it still is generally true that the south has a lower tax burden - but the variation is much less pronounced. For instance going from Michigan to Florida likely increases your tax burden - https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/tax-burden-by-state-2022/ and the range from 10th to 40th is 9-12% - so most are pretty narrowly aligned, although outliers moving from New York to Alaska would be a profound tax savings.

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u/FoolishChemist 3d ago

Don't forget house insurance costs as well. Michigan you can get it pretty easily, but in Florida, you better just hope a hurricane doesn't blow your house away.

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u/ibled_orange 3d ago

My parents looked into moving from NY to Florida and yes they'd save on income tax but their car insurance expense alone would cause their cost of living to be higher.

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u/davegraham71 3d ago

Also really depends on what income bracket you are in. If I remember correctly I think if you are in like the lower 2/3 (maybe half - old and bad memory) of income then your Texas all in taxes are higher than CA.

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u/JD_Waterston 3d ago

Very true - and a lot of ‘low tax’ states have higher registration and licensure costs. But if you’re making millions, then income taxes play a larger role. Kinda funny that a lot of folks who move also retire, when income plays the smallest role and other taxes the largest.

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u/gsfgf 3d ago

and a lot of ‘low tax’ states have higher registration and licensure costs

Yea. When 2008 hit, and Georgia ran out of reserves, we couldn't "raise taxes" or else Grover Norquist would get mad. So we raised "fees" instead.

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u/Wanderingghost12 3d ago

Washington has no income tax and Oregon/Montana have no sales tax, but that doesn't seem to stop it from being super expensive here but both PNW states are far behind the growth of FL/TX

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u/gsfgf 3d ago

Yea. I'm in Atlanta. I assume that if the stage GOP actually does eliminate the state income tax, I'll end up paying more. APS will have to raise property taxes to offset cuts from the state.

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u/MW_Daught 3d ago

Yes, in theory, tax burden is comparable ... but only for average/median incomes. If you're looking to move for tax reasons in the first place, chances are you have heap of income and for that purpose, states with no income tax are king.

I personally avoided having to pay California around $1.1m in taxes since I relocated to Florida 4 years ago. My property tax is barely $20k or thereabouts, which is almost irrelevant, and sales tax is even less. If I moved to another state that had medium income tax/no property tax or whatnot, the burden would still be substantially higher.

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u/JD_Waterston 3d ago edited 3d ago

A lot of people who make 250k(or even 50k) still move for taxes, if for questionable reasons - for high incomes the situation may be different, but yeah if you make extreme amounts it’s potentially different.

Also, if you saved 1.1 in 4 years - you’re talking about 3m/yr in income - which puts you in a percentile which isn’t relevant for population movement statistics. You’re basically an edge case.

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u/CiDevant 3d ago

I wish I could find a way to explain that to my Dad.  The way he talks you think he only moved to Florida for the Taxes.  Also his public school grandkids there are dumb as rocks compared to his grandkids who are either in private schools or other state public schools.  It's honestly really sad to see where my nephew / neices are developmentally compared to my kids and my other brothers kids.

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u/bobbybouchier 2d ago

Florida is ranked pretty high amongst US states in public school education?

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u/CiDevant 1d ago

According to World Report 41st and NEA 42nd isn't very high IMO.  But thanks for making me actually check my work.

Because I did see some "reports" that listed it much higher I looked at average college entrances exam scores and Forbes ranks FL 30th when looking at all test scores in 2024.

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u/bobbybouchier 1d ago

I suppose the wide variance between reports is attributable to how each report weights their metrics. US news & Reports ranks them 10th in K-12.

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u/slayer_of_idiots 3d ago

Anecdotally, areas of the south are popular for retirees whose children have all grown up and moved away. You can buy a large property in the south for half of what you can sell a small suburban family house in most popular metropolitan areas.

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u/beenoc 3d ago

North Carolina (#2 and #7) has state income tax, so it's not just that. However, we do have low corporate tax rate and other policies that make us very good for business (and bad for workers), and the Triangle and Charlotte are growing because of jobs.

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u/SaltyShawarma 3d ago

Hot take: lower tax burdens for business negatively affect their workers and their neighborhoods. Lower tax burdens for corpos is actually BAD for business... but good for shareholder profits.

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u/StressOverStrain 3d ago

United States tax codes are so riddled with corporate deductions that tinkering with the tax rate is a fool’s errand. Raise the tax and companies will just find more ways to spend the money on things they can deduct.

It’d be far easier to just tax personal income at higher rates, especially the wealthy.

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u/gsfgf 3d ago

Also, y'all are phasing out your state income tax. Which will obviously backfire.

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u/papertowelroll17 3d ago

Wait, what? This chart has Austin growing faster than Miami...

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u/ryan_770 3d ago

The region lines are a bit weird though. Feels odd to include northern Virginia and central Texas in "The South", but not parts of Alabama.

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u/hallese 3d ago

It's only weird because we're used to hand jamming entire states into regions. Nothing better exemplifies the distinct nature of Appalachia from the South than the existence of West Virginia. If you were to look at a light pollution map the boundaries would also make a lot more sense for Appalachia and as you move west from Midwest to Great Plains to Mountain West. When this gets further broken down Maine and New Orleans are often grouped together because of the shared history of the first European groups to settle in both regions.

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u/windershinwishes 3d ago

I agree in general, but the specifics are still a bit off to me. I agree that the northeast corner of Alabama is Appalachian, but I definitely wouldn't describe Birmingham as part of Appalachia rather than part of the South. I mean, it's next to a mountain...but it's more of a glorified hill.

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u/hallese 3d ago

It's hand-jamming counties instead of states, there's still room for debate. I mean, there always will be, but now instead of debating entire states with millions of people, the debate is centered on counties with smaller populations.

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u/gsfgf 3d ago

Birmingham is 100% the South. The city itself is 2/3 Black, for starters.

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u/devourke 3d ago

I definitely wouldn't describe Birmingham as part of Appalachia rather than part of the South

As someone who moved to the US as an adult who was initially confused by Americans using a completely different definition of the word "South" than the rest of the world, the one thing I've noticed is that almost everyone and their mother has a different personal definition of what states/regions actually count as "the South". Especially those from the actual regions commonly in dispute.

Don't even get me started on the so called Midwest which should 100% be renamed to the Middle East (maybe if America had their own Middle East, they'd spend less time messing around in other people's Middle East)

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u/windershinwishes 3d ago

We already changed the name from "the West" to "the Midwest" so I agree that another change is due.

"Southeast" is used fairly often, but it's no surprise that "the South" has staying power as a name, the Southwest notwithstanding; when the brand identity is deeply involved with the biggest event in the country's history, it's hard to shake.

In my view (as an Alabamian who has lived in various parts of the state including Birmingham, but has only visited the mountainous region a few times) the entirety of the state can be classified as part of the Deep South, but it does make geographic sense to label the northeastern corner as "Appalachia". It literally is part of the mountain range, after all, and I'm pretty sure it was economically and culturally distinct from the majority of the state in the antebellum/war period, as was typical for the region.

I suppose I might be falling for stereotypical thinking on this though, imagining Appalachia purely as isolated hollers and what not. Birmingham is a coal mining town afterall.

These minute distinctions are more historical than contemporarily relevant though. I'll see maps like this identifying the coastal region as distinct from the rest of the state, for example, and it's true that Mobile has a totally separate history and had a very distinct culture from the rest of the state...but in the 21st century everything is more homogenized. Aside from Mardi Gras and a greater number of Catholics, there's no apparent distinction between Mobilian culture and general Alabamian culture, aside from general urban/rural divides. (I guess there's probably more among the old money crowd there, but I wouldn't really know.)

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u/gsfgf 3d ago

Part of it is the legacy of the Confederacy. And the Confederacy still shows up on a surprising number of maps.

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u/thetanplanman 3d ago

I mean, it changes from "The South" to "The Northeast" on the map right around Fredericksburg which is pretty much where I'd put the line.

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u/Chotibobs 3d ago

Florida and Texas are the only states with no state income tax. North Carolina and Georgia have state income tax. 

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u/SuicideNote 3d ago edited 3d ago

What about Raleigh vs Miami. Super hot growth in Raleigh, barely any tower development--takes half decade for a project to get started--if it gets started at all, Miami seemly unlimited tower construction. Yet Raleigh grows like there's no tomorrow. Nashville metro which is smaller than Raleigh still out-performs in this department too.

North Carolina has income tax.