The U.S. population has grown by 1.2 million this year, with growth largely driven by international migration, and the country now has 333.2 million residents, according to estimates compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau. Published on Thursday.
Net international migration — the number of people moving to the United States minus the number of people leaving — is more than 1 million residents between 2021 and 2022. This represents a growth rate of 168% compared to 376,029 migrants. internationalization of the previous year, with each state attracting residents from abroad, according to population estimates for 2022.
Natural growth – births minus deaths – added another 245,080 to the total, the first annual increase in total births since 2007.
The U.S. annual growth rate of 0.4% this year is a rebound of some sort from the 0.1% growth rate during the worst of the pandemic from 2020 to 2021. , the lowest level since the founding of the nation.
“It’s welcome because we would be back to near-flat growth without this immigration,” said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution.
By region, the Northeast has lost nearly 219,000 people, following a trend mainly due to residents moving out of the country from New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts, as well as a higher number of deaths than births in Pennsylvania. The Midwest also lost nearly 49,000 residents, in part because of people leaving Illinois and a higher number of deaths than births in Ohio.
The South added 1.3 million residents, the largest of any region, due to population growth in Texas and Florida, each with half a million residents. Other Southern states such as North Carolina, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee had the largest number of growth in the US
Texas, the second most populous state in the United States, has passed the 30 million resident mark, joining California as the only other state in this category.
But California has lost more than 113,000 residents and its population to just over 39 million by 2022, the largest annual decline after New York’s loss of more than 180,000 residents. The population drop was caused by more than 343,000 residents in the country moving out of California, and it helped drag the West region’s population growth down to just 153,000 residents.
Despite the overall population decline, California has the largest international population growth of any state, just a hair ahead of Florida with more than 125,000 people. California also had the second-highest natural increase, behind only Texas. Births outnumber deaths and international arrivals make California’s population loss rate smaller than last year, when it dropped more than 358,000 residents.
The Western region by 2022 has lost some of its glamor as a magnet for domestic migration. Without international migration and a substantial natural increase from births exceeding deaths, the Western region would lose its population as domestic residents also move out of Oregon and Washington. Western hotspots like Utah, Idaho and Montana saw smaller increases from last year.
According to Frey, part of the slower growth in the West is related to the pandemic, which has resulted in fewer people moving and an increasing cost of living in places that were once seen as cheaper alternatives to California. , according to Frey.
“There’s not much magnetism for those vintage magnets to move out of California,” says Frey.
Puerto Rico has lost 40,000 residents, or 1.3% of its population, due to displacement and deaths exceeding births, and its population now stands at 3.2 million.
