Stark population decline projected for NYS – New York’s population expected to decline by over 2 million by 2050.
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/11/stark-population-decline-projected-nys
Stark population decline projected for NYS – New York’s population expected to decline by over 2 million by 2050.
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/11/stark-population-decline-projected-nys
13 Comments
From the article
>New York state’s population could shrink by more than 2 million people over the next 25 years – a decline of more than 13%, according to a new report.
>The report, prepared by researchers from the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy’s Program on Applied Demographics (PAD) with funding from New York state, projects that New York faces a significant population decline due to low fertility rates and aging that has not been offset by new arrivals.
Sounds like a good thing imo. Less traffic, crowds, etc.
This is a housing issue. People are leaving NYS because it’s too expensive and as the housing supply continues to get owned by older and wealthier people, it’s only going to get worse. Unless they can find a way to build more housing state wide, I dont see this problem fixing itself
The city is unliveable.
Out of control rents, skyrocketing crime, terrible place to do business
Easily solved nearly over night of they truely wanted to.
Edit: Come on down-voters, tell me where Im wrong. It was an amazing city 20 years ago and total mess now
Wonder if they account for climate change and how that will alter projections! Doesn’t mention in the article!
Stop bending people over with your insane rent prices
jfc just build some more homes where people want to live
I love how folks see these and then only talk about NYC, NYS is huge compared to just NYC. That said we are recent implants to NYS having just moved from WY to Rochester NY and we had another kid when we arrived because despite the “high” cost of living here in NY, it actually wasn’t really that much higher and in some areas way lower then living in WY and CO. Property taxes are out of control, but great schools make up for it, but utilities and food are the same or in the case of water way cheaper. But considering all of America is experiencing a drop in population with folks not able to afford to have children and housing being stupid expensive cause god forbid you build affordable homes how is any of this surprising? Old folks die and there aren’t young people to replace them. The irony of course is that the fix is an increase in immigration to make up for the lack of available population for jobs. Which the upcoming administration is fully against. Derp
When the government treats you like a farm animal, taking just enough away from you so that you don’t die, no wonder people want to leave.
As someone from Long Island, I think it’s a mix of things. There’s no new construction, so housing is absurdly expensive. You need a minimum of $700k to live outside of a bad area. The area tends to attract immigrant families who pride themselves on hard work. So this area has the worst case of “hustle culture” that I’ve ever seen after living a few places in the US. People have absurd commutes, gobble up ridiculous overtime hours, take second, third, and fourth jobs. There’s always someone willing to outwork you on that front. So many people who grew up middle class either get stuck in work mode or get married and still live with their parents or a studio apartment, waiting for years until they feel like they can bring a new kid into the world. Since this is *the* place that hard workers from all around the world came to make it and suburbanize to over the past century, there’s a lot of cultural programming that it’s your fault for not being able to cut it here.
Very hard to make a prediction like this with climate change and climate migration such a big factor. Florida the long held migration destination is show sign of big change.
I’m not sure why upstate NY isnt more popular. It’s cheap as hell to live in a decent small town within 30 minutes of a big city like Rochester, Syracuse, or Buffalo. Meanwhile minimum wage is like $17.
Its a slackers delight. Meanwhile regular non-slackers live like kings in dirt cheap, giant houses.
While many people are complaining about housing costs as the driver, that is likely not the case. Housing costs are highest in New York CITY, yet NYC is actually expecting a population increase: While New York State population is decreasing, New York City population is expected to increase from 8.2 million up to 9 million. [https://www.nyc.gov/assets/planning/download/pdf/planning-level/nyc-population/projections_briefing_booklet_2010_2040.pdf](https://www.nyc.gov/assets/planning/download/pdf/planning-level/nyc-population/projections_briefing_booklet_2010_2040.pdf)
So really it is about the rural areas of New York State emptying out. If NYC is adding about a million people, and the state is losing about 2 million in total, that means the rural areas are actually losing 3 million people. Of the 19 million state residents, 8 million are from NYC. So this means that in the remaining rural state population of 11 million, they will have a loss of 3 million. Thus, the actual data, for the rural state areas is much much worse than a “13% loss” as stated in this Cornell paper–they are actually losing close to 30% of their population in the next 25 years (3 million divided by 11 million). The rural areas are being decimated. Imagine: 1 in 3 houses will be vacant.
However, a big unknown here is population migration due to climate change. New York State is actually very well positioned to withstand climate change. Most of the US below New York State will be facing moderate to very high risks of drought, which increases risk of fires, etc. New York, Vermont, Maine, and Washington state/Oregon are the only US states that are expected to see stable or increased rainfall over the next 50 years. So we may see an uptick in migration into these far northern states.
If I had money to spare, perhaps buying land in NY state makes sense as the population declines in the near term, anticipating a population boom in the 2040+ window.