Staff writer
Recession cuts Idaho's numbers, but state still has sixth-fastest rate
The recession is stunting Idaho's growth.
Idaho remained one of the nation's fastest growing states in 2008, but the recession slowed that growth dramatically, according to statistics recently released Monday by the U.S. Census Bureau.
The agency estimates the state's population grew 1.85 percent between mid-2007 and mid-2008, the sixth-fastest rate among the states but the slowest growth rate for Idaho since 2002 in the aftermath of the last national recession.
The top five fast-growing states were, in order, Utah (2.53 percent), Arizona (2.31), Texas (2.03), North Carolina (2.0) and Colorado (2.0).
"While Idaho's economy has slowed dramatically, it started from one of the strongest bases of any state and the situation, while serious to the people in Idaho, is comparatively better than it is in places like the Midwest, Upper Midwest and the West Coast," said Bob Fick, spokesman for the Idaho Department of Labor. "Whether that continues remains to be seen."
Numbers for counties will be released in the spring.
Nationally, the population grew 0.9 percent, slightly slower than the year before.
Nearly 28,000 more people lived in Idaho in 2008 than the year before, sending the state's total population to 1,523,816.
The slowdown in Idaho's growth was the result of a significant decline in the number of people moving to the state from elsewhere in the country and the world, Fick said.
Migration fell to 14,000 from mid-2007 to mid-2008, the first time under 20,000 in four years. Migration was responsible for Idaho's population growth running at 2.4 percent in 2005, 2.6 percent in 2006 and 2.4 percent again in 2007.
"The last time there was serious out-migration was the decade of the 1980s," said Fick, adding that only in 1981 did the state show a positive in-migration.
"The state economic forecast from the Division of Financial Management sees in-migration dropping to between 5,000 and 6,000 in 2009 and then picking up again. It doesn't appear that the situation -- at least from what appears to be the case now -- will approach the severity of the 1980s."
The new estimate also put natural population growth -- births less deaths -- at 14,000, the first time natural growth has matched migration since the recovery from the 2001 recession began in 2003.
But despite the economic slowdown that has cost Idaho 18,000 jobs in the past year, the state remained a magnet, Fick said. The 14,000 people who moved to Idaho from other states or countries pushed the Gem State to 18th for total migration.
Idaho remained the 39th most populated state, about 260,000 behind Nebraska and 200,000 ahead of Maine.
Since the 2000 census, Idaho's population has increased nearly 18 percent -- 230,000 people -- the fifth-fastest rate nationally behind Nevada, Arizona, Utah and Georgia. About 100,000 of that increase came from natural growth and the rest from migration.
