California still bleeding residents amid looming $68B deficit as population flees to Republican states

Residents of California continued to leave the state in 2023 with reports showing many defectors heading to Arizona, Texas, Florida, and North Carolina.

After 410,000 residents left the state in 2020-2021, and another 340,000 between 2021-2022, several reports have indicated the trend continued in 2023 as the Golden State racked up a $38 billion deficit. The state also projects a $68 billion deficit for 2024-2025.

An August 2023 report from moving company Pods reported that Los Angeles ranked first in terms of cities that saw the most residents move out. Second was the San Francisco/Bay Area, both of which held their positions from the year before.

Stockton-Modesto and Santa Barbara, California also made the same list at ninth and tenth, respectively.

At the same time, the Carolinas, Florida, and Texas saw the highest number of people move into their cities.

Wilmington, North Carolina, and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, combined to top the list, while other North Carolina locations, including Charlotte, Asheville, and Raleigh each made the top 20 destinations. Greenville - Spartanburg, South Carolina, came in tenth.

Houston, Dallas-Forth Worth, and San Antonio were the top Texas destinations for new residents, too.

Phoenix, Arizona, also made the list, a popular destination for Californians in addition to Texas.

According to a report from the San Francisco Chronicle, more than 175,000 California residents moved to Arizona (74,000) and Texas (102,000) in 2021-2022. While 69,000 moved westward from the those states, that's still a net migration of -106,000 for California.

Net-negative migration has been a growing trend for Gavin Newsom's state under his rule; from 2017-2021, one in every five people moving to Arizona were from California, Yahoo! News stated.

Then there's Florida: Sarasota, Orlando, Ocala, Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, and Melbourne were all included in the top-20 list of most move-ins for 2023, as well. The Sunshine State also saw over 50,000 Californians move to the east coast in 2021-2022.

What's worse for California is that more than 500,000 residents with at least a bachelor's degree have moved out of the state between 2021-2022, the LA Times reported. While approximately 350,000 college graduates moved-in during the same time period, that's still a net loss of 150,000.

This has contributed to a 25% drop in personal income tax collection in 2023, the outlet claimed, which helped add to the state's shiny new $68 billion deficit projection.

While complicated, the deficit is due in part to both over-spending and the aforementioned mass exodus.

The state's own report added that "revenues are lower than Budget Act projections by $58 Billion" while it also anticipated a "deficit of around $14 billion."

Simply put, the state was always going to spend more money than it had, but spent way more due to overestimating its revenues and underestimating its deficit.

The state's debt skyrocketed over just one fiscal year, increasing by over seven times from -$5.1 billion to -$38 billion. For fiscal year 2024-2025, it is projected to nearly double once more to -$67.59 billion.

Not to worry, because the state's same forecasters project "flat revenue growth for 2023-24, with positive growth returning in 2024-25 and beyond."

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