Job seekers: 61K new residents in past year

Brice Wallace 

With employment opportunities acting as a lure to outsiders, people moving to Utah continues to be the driving force in the state’s population growth.

The state on July 1 is estimated to have had a total of just more than 3.4 million residents, adding 61,242 during the previous 12 months, according to the Utah Population Committee, chaired and staffed by the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute.{mprestriction ids="1,3"}

Net migration — more people moving in than moving out — was the major reason for the increase, compared with natural increases resulting from more births than deaths, the committee said. Net migration represented 62 percent of the population growth, the second year in a row for net migration to outpace natural changes.

“Migration is historically more volatile than natural increase and is sensitive to societal and economic situations. Positive net migration is often an indicator of favorable economic conditions, particularly in the western United States,” the study said.

“Utah’s strong economy in 2022, combined with dampened effects of natural increase … helped make net migration the dominant driver of growth for the July 1, 2022, estimates.”

Leading the way was Utah County, in the heart of the tech-focused Silicon Slopes area, which added 23,980 people during the year and accounted for over 39 percent of the state’s population growth. Net migration there was 64 percent, with only about one-third of the overall growth being a natural increase.

Utah County’s population growth was more than double that of second-place Salt Lake County, which grew by about 10,000.

“The midyear reference date of these estimates reflects the economy opening and thriving in the middle of the pandemic, leading up to a turning point in the economic picture and resulting in a different growth trajectory in the latter half of 2022,” the committee said in its report. “The 2023 population estimates will likely capture that slowdown.”

“In 2022, Utah continued to experience strong population growth, adding the most residents since 2006, with net migration driving nearly two-thirds of the increase,” said Mallory Bateman, director of demographic research at the Gardner Institute. “This shift in the past two years from natural increase to net migration driving most of the growth reflects the combined impacts of increased deaths from COVID-19, decreasing births since 2008, and increasing net migration annually since 2015.”

The committee said the increase of 61,242 Utah residents was equivalent to adding a new city the size of Herriman or Taylorsville. While six counties experienced a natural decrease due to more deaths than births due to aging populations, five or those six still grew due to net migration.

Utah’s overall growth rate during the 12 months prior to July 1 was 1.8 percent. Births increased for the first time since 2015. The natural increase was over 23,000. Twenty-eight counties saw population growth, all but one driven by net migration.

For the second year in a row, Iron County experienced the fastest population growth, at 4.3 percent. Also seeing growth over 3 percent were Wasatch, Utah, Kane, Rich, Juab and Sanpete counties. Daggett County was the only population that decreased.

“The latest population estimates reflect a particular inflection point in the statewide story of growth and change, with the 2023 estimates likely reflecting broader economic shifts and their resulting impacts to migration,” said Laura Hanson, state planning coordinator at the Utah Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget and Utah Population Committee member. “These data are critical when planning for Utah’s future needs as our population grows and diversifies.”

The report is available at https://gardner.utah.edu/.{/mprestriction}