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Yahoo
15-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Largest cities are growing again but getting more unaffordable
Pedestrians walk through a shopping district in Manhattan in New York City. The city grew in population for the second year in a row, but remains below pandemic levels. (Photo by) For a second year in a row, New York City and Los Angeles were among the cities with the most population growth last year as the nation's largest cities continued to recover from devastating pandemic losses. The U.S. Census Bureau released new July 2024 city population estimates Thursday. In New York City, a recent city planning report suggested that 'two consecutive years of growth suggest that pandemic-era losses were short-lived.' The city is still almost 328,000 short of its 2020 population, however. Los Angeles returned to the list of top growth cities for the first time since 2016, according to the Census Bureau. Get in touch Are you a teacher, nurse or skilled trades worker looking to buy a house or condo in today's market? We'd like to talk to you about the experience of trying to buy a home with a household income of around $75,000 a year — email Tim Henderson at thenderson@ The largest one-year population increases for mid-2023 to mid-2024 were New York City (87,184), Houston (43,217), Los Angeles (31,276), and the Texas cities of San Antonio (23,945) and Fort Worth (23,442). The same cities were in the top five the previous year, but the growth is a big turnaround from 2021-22, when New York City lost almost 100,000 people and Los Angeles gained only about 2,000. A new interest in living in big cities could be impacting rents: Zillow reported this week that there now are eight cities, double the number from 2020, where renters need more than a $100,000 annual income to afford typical rent: New York City ($145,000 needed), San Jose, California ($137,000), Boston ($127,000), San Francisco ($124,000), San Diego ($123,000), Los Angeles ($119,000), Miami ($110,000) and Riverside, California ($103,000). Homes for sale in the fastest-growing city areas also are getting further out of reach for even moderate-income buyers, according to a National Association of Realtors report also released Thursday. The New York City and Los Angeles areas were listed as 'moving in the wrong direction' on affordability, 'reflecting a growing divide between what homes actually cost and what local families can afford.' For instance, even a Los Angeles-area family with a $200,000 income can afford less than a third of the homes listed for sale, including condominiums and townhouses, according to the report. Houston, San Antonio and the Dallas-Fort Worth area were listed among three tiers as 'stuck in the middle' of affordability, 'showing signs of progress, yet still falling short of offering real affordability to most families.' For the four years combined after the COVID-19 pandemic started in 2020, both New York City and Los Angeles have not completely recovered population. New York City is down almost 328,000 people and Los Angeles is still short about 21,000 since the 2020 census, but they remain the nation's two largest cities. The largest percentage growth since 2020 was in some fast-growing suburbs: Westlake, Florida, near Palm Beach, has grown to 7,664, more than eight times its 2020 population, and Josephine, Texas, near Dallas, has quadrupled in size to 8,807. Medicine Lake, Minnesota, west of Minneapolis, also quadrupled, to 1,343. Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@ SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump aims to shut down state climate policies
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday targeting states laws and regulations geared at combatting climate change. President Donald Trump has launched an all-out legal attack on states' authority to set climate change policy. His executive order, issued Tuesday, directs the Department of Justice to challenge a huge swath of state laws and regulations. The order aims at measures that seek to cut carbon emissions, penalize energy companies and limit drilling permits. It also targets state-led lawsuits against fossil fuel companies over the damages caused by climate change. Trump's directive orders Attorney General Pam Bondi to 'stop the enforcement' of any state laws related to climate change, including any that are seen as 'burdening' the use of domestic energy resources. Such language could include state laws that mandate a transition to clean electricity sources. The order specifically calls out 'climate Superfund' policies in Vermont and New York, which require fossil fuel companies to pay for some of the damages caused by climate change. It also targets California's cap-and-trade law, which places a limit on emissions through auctions of carbon credits. Wind and solar power opponents make headway in state legislatures While Trump's order says such state policies are unconstitutional, climate-focused state leaders say his administration has no legal basis to unravel their efforts. 'The federal government cannot unilaterally strip states' independent constitutional authority,' New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, both Democrats, wrote in a joint statement from the U.S. Climate Alliance. 'We are a nation of states — and laws — and we will not be deterred.' Hochul and Lujan Grisham co-chair the alliance, a coalition of 24 governors focused on reducing emissions. Climate disasters are on the rise. These states want to make oil companies pay. Michael Gerrard, faculty director of Columbia University's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, told Politico that the order is 'toothless.' '[Trump] has no authority on his own to nullify state laws,' he told the outlet. But the order throws the might of the federal government into a sprawling legal battle over states' authority to set climate policy and seek damages for disasters. It could force states to face expensive litigation and years of legal uncertainty. Trump-appointed judges on the U.S. Supreme Court and elsewhere have at times been hostile to environmental regulations. And it's unclear whether the order will have a chilling effect on state efforts to craft more climate legislation. Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@ Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: info@
