People moving between states sharply dropped in 2023 after it became harder to get jobs working from home.
Nearly 7.6 million people aged 1 year and older moved out of state in 2023 from around 8.2 million in 2022, marking the the lowest level within the last four recorded years, according to a ConsumerAffairs analysis of the latest state migration data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
The drop in people moving between states represents a more than 8% decline in 2023 from 2022, the biggest percentage dip going back to 2010.
Why did fewer people move out of state in 2023?
A reason there's been a drop in people moving out of state is because remote jobs that make it easier to move have grown more scarce.
The decline in people moving between states follows a surge in state-to-state migration spurred by the pandemic, which caused layoffs and let more people get remote jobs that led them to move more freely.
Remote workers are more likely to move out of state, particularly among younger generations such as millennials, according to a study of 2022 population data by coworking platform Yardi.
In 2021, the share of remote workers who moved in the prior year was nearly 16% versus around 13% for in-person workers, according to a New York Times analysis of U.S. Census data.
And according to the U.S. Career Institute, 36% of remote workers planned a move in 2023, compared with 27% of on-site workers.
Now, working from home has become rarer and stricter company policies have made it more difficult for people to easily move between states.
Back to the office
Companies, such as Amazon and Dell for instance, have recently required their employees to work from the office five days a week.
Remote work accounted for around 10% of U.S. job postings in Dec. 2023, down from a peak of around 20% in April 2022, according to LinkedIn.
Hybrid work, which requires employees to be in the office a certain number of days, has become the new normal after employers dialed back from allowing working from home, LinkedIn said.
The push against remote work, driven by employer concerns about productivity and wasted office real estate, means employees aren't able to reap the financial benefits that come from moving to a different state.
For instance, remote workers can often take higher salaries to more affordable states and move places with less burdensome taxes.