Utah population tops 3.5 million, but growth rate down slightly

Yahoo

13-02-2025

Utah's population growth slowed slightly in 2024, but the Beehive State still added 50,392 more residents last year, with much of the growth in Utah and Salt Lake counties.
Natural growth — the balancing of births to deaths — and migration were about equally responsible for the population increase. Migration numbers take the number of people moving in and out of the state to determine if migration rose or fell. Net migration was responsible for 52% of the growth, while natural increase accounted for 48% of the new residents.
Utah now has an estimated 3,506,838 residents.
The estimates released Thursday in a policy brief by the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah suggest that the population is close to what was expected before COVID-19 raged. The numbers indicate that the population has stabilized into a more normal pattern and the pandemic's influence — more migration than natural increase — is no longer a big factor, said Emily Harris, senior demographer at the institute.
'Honestly, we've been anticipating slowing growth for a while,' Harris told the Deseret News. 'When I look at the numbers now, they look very similar to what we were estimating in terms of raw numbers kind of pre-pandemic. So it feels like we are on the other side of the pandemic fully now.'
She noted, however, that it's hard to say whether the population pattern indicates a trend. That typically takes at least three years, though two years can say something might be going on.
'Births and deaths remained mostly unchanged from last year,' per the policy brief. 'Natural increase did not meaningfully change for the first time in over 10 years,' increasing by just 48 people to 24,374 in 2024.
'We're not seeing this really high growth every single year that, depending on who you talk to, is a good or a bad thing,' Harris said.
In 2024, 21 counties had some population growth, again the driving forces about equally divided. Eight counties saw a drop in population, which is a higher number of counties than usual, Harris said.
Utah County added the most people, with 21,853 new residents. That's been the pattern for the past five years. The institute reported Utah County saw 43% of the state's population growth in the 2024 estimates. Salt Lake County came in second with 12,113 new residents and 57% of its population growth was due to natural increase.
But among all of Utah's counties with more than 5,000 residents, Tooele County had the fastest growth rate, at 3.1%. Iron, Piute, Rich, Utah, Wasatch and Washington counties each grew by around 2%.
The report said that net migration is 'more volatile than natural increase' because what is happening in society and the economy impact it. Positive net migration can indicate favorable economic conditions, drawing people into an area for jobs or a decent cost of living.
'Utah's low but increasing unemployment rate and slowing employment growth in 2024 align with slowing growth and net migration' in the estimate, the brief says.
'We know that housing starts are slowing and people are less eager to buy,' Harris said. 'There are a lot of things going on right now that I think are impacting movement in particular people.'
The counties that lost population were Daggett, which had a 1.5% population loss, Emery (1.2% decrease in population), Carbon (down 1%), Sevier (down 0.9%), Uintah (down 0.9%), Garfield (down 0.5%), Summit (down 0.4%) and Kane (down 0.3%).
Harris pointed out population declines in coal country and some parts of southwest Utah, including Garfield and Kane counties, but said only time will tell if that becomes a trend and not a blip.
Harris said the Census Bureau releases its county estimates in March and Utah will see how the estimates compare.
The estimates are created by the Utah Population Committee, which includes representatives from the Gardner institute, Utah Department of Health and Human Services, State Board of Education, Governor's Office of Planning and Budget, the Department of Workforce Services, Utah State Tax Commission, Dominion Energy, Utah State University, Utah System of Higher Education and Office of the Legislative Fiscal Analyst. The committee uses U.S. Census and more Utah-centric data sources, such as vital records, school enrollment, housing unit data and IRS tax exemptions.
'Each different data component enables us to make sure that we're tracking different parts of the population, because no single data source will tell us everything that we need to know about everybody,' Harris said. 'That enables us to really have a pulse on the different age structure of the population and the different types of people. Not everybody's going to file tax returns, not everyone's going to be in school ...'
Having subject matter experts who are very familiar with the different data components on the committee also improves the estimates, she said.