California’s Population Drops by 0.3% With Covid, Fewer Births

(Bloomberg) -- California’s population declined 0.3% last year, as births couldn’t keep pace with an aging population, residents leaving for other locales, Covid-related deaths and restrictive federal policies on immigration.

That means California’s population stands at 39,185,605, according to a report released Monday from the state’s finance department.

The majority of counties lost residents, including the three most populous: Los Angeles, San Diego and Orange, according to the report. 

The report also confirmed anecdotal evidence of priced-out people moving inland from expensive seafront cities: every coastal county lost population except San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Santa Cruz, and that’s due partly because they’re home to college students returning to campus. 

Meanwhile, communities in the Central Valley and the Inland Empire continued to grow. Of the 10 largest cities in California, Bakersfield had the largest percentage gain in population at 0.7%.

“As baby boomers age, and fertility declines among younger cohorts, the continuing slowdown in natural increase -- births minus deaths -- underlies the plateauing of the state’s population growth,” the report said. “The addition of COVID-19-related deaths, federal policies restricting immigration, and an increase in domestic out-migration further affected population totals.”

California’s 10 largest cities as of January 2022:

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