Migration patterns shift as more Americans stay put

Americans are no longer flocking south to Sun Belt states in large numbers as they did prior to the recession, a new study finds. The typical migration pattern from the cold, snowy north to the sunny south has slowed dramatically, according to a new study by the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire.

Researchers evaluated three years’ worth of data to reveal migration patterns since the financial crisis. They found that more Americans are staying put, unable or not wanting to move due to a bleak employment picture and sagging housing market.

Former migration hot-spot states like Arizona, Nevada and Florida added fewer residents since the start of the recession, and that influx continued to shrink in 2010. Most analysts expect the decline to start leveling off.

Meanwhile, states like Massachusetts, New York and California, which had seen their populations decrease in favor of Sun Belt states the last few years, are now seeing far fewer declines.

“When times get really hard, it gets really hard for people to up and move,” says Kenneth M. Johnson, the senior demographer at the Carsey Institute. “People who might have left New York for North Carolina are staying put. But that is a very recent change, so that places that had been growing rapidly suddenly aren’t, and the outflow has really slowed down.”

For example, Florida had a net migration gain of 209,000 in 2005, but a loss of 30,000 in 2009, according to the study. On the other hand, New York had a net loss of 71,000 migrants in 2009 — a drastic shift from the 170,000 migrants it lost in 2005. Likewise, California saw its loss of migrants shrink to 71,000 in 2009 from 201,000 in 2005.