The Lessons of California Leaving in 2020, Part 1

Professional baseball player and amateur philosopher Yogi Berra once observed that, “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.” Decades later, Berra’s observation is a perfect summary of the California demographic shift in 2020. 

The most populous state with nearly 40 million residents is also the state where hundreds of people moved out of the state each day. In fact, the 2020 Census records show 135,000 more people moved out of California than moved in.¹ The exodus out of the state in 2020 resulted in the “Golden State” losing its first congressional seat in California’s 170 year history.²

Part of a National Trend 

California was one of seven states that lost a congressional seat as millions of people moved states in 2020.³ The Wall Street Journal reported that, “Big cities including New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Boston saw hundreds of thousands more residents move out than in, in changes they labeled permanent, causing the net loss of households from migration to widen by 71% in 2020 from the previous year. . . The suburbs of large metropolitan areas captured much of the outflow. Net new suburban households from migration rose 43% in 2020 from the prior year, helping swell the counties surrounding Dallas, Indianapolis, Nashville, Tenn., and Charlotte, N.C., among others.”⁴ 

Why did so many people move in 2020? 

There were unique circumstances and compelling incentives for people to relocate in 2020. The pandemic untethered families from their existing community by way of working from home options and virtual school learning. Many for the first time were freed to look farther afield without the concern of being near the office or close to their children’s school. 

Economic incentives including low mortgage rates and lower tax rates in other states also motivated many to move. Health concerns were also a large motivator for families to relocate away from crowded states and cities. Suburban and rural communities had fewer Covid cases on average and did not present the higher-risk health factors of cities like crowding or public transportation. 

Yet the underlying reason why people moved was neither new nor unique to 2020. At the heart of why most people move is the belief that life would be better by living somewhere else. 

A California History Case Study

Over the last 170 years, hundreds of thousands of people have migrated to the Golden State. California history, therefore, provides an interesting case study to test this belief if moving somewhere else does bring its intended promise of a better life.

The first migration rush into the Golden State was for the Gold Rush of 1849, which is why San Francisco’s NFL team is called the ‘49ers.’ In the year before California was officially a U.S. state in 1850, nearly 300,000 people relocated to the state in the hopes to strike gold. Pioneers from the U.S. east coast, China, Russia, Latin America and Europe all flooded into the state to seek prosperity. 

Few in fact did strike gold, but some still struck it rich. Entrepreneur Levi Strauss, for example, made a fortune by producing and patenting riveted blue jeans. Miners found Levi’s “waist overalls” more durable and thus the Levi denim empire was built. As part of his legacy, the 49ers play in Levi’s Stadium today. 

Throughout the 1900s people continued to flood into the state. One of the draws to Southern California in particular was the thriving movie industry in Hollywood. Film studios originally moved to the LA area in the 1910s to evade Thomas Edison’s patent restrictions on motion picture technology. As silent pictures turned into “talkies” in 1927 and then into technicolor films, starting with The Wizard of Oz in 1939, the industry grew and attracted more and more people who were seeking prominence. 

California continued to grow in the Great Depression of the 1930s as many moved to the Central Valley for farm work as famously portrayed in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. During WWII, many African-Americans moved to the state to work for the war effort including at the Bay Area’s Kaiser shipyards. (After the war, the Kaiser company shifted to building hospitals.) 

Throughout the 1950s-1970s, large suburban tracts were built throughout the state to house the millions moving to California. Jobs and affordable housing were aplenty to greet the millions who were escaping harsh winters to enjoy the beautiful weather and relaxed California lifestyle that was idealized on TV shows such as “Gidget” and “The Brady Bunch.”⁵

The most recent wave of migrants to California came starting in the 1970s to the San Francisco Bay area of Silicon Valley to become pioneers. Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin, Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, Mark Zuckerberg, and the founders of Intel, YouTube, eBay, Pixar, Netflix, and many more all came to the state to innovate within their field along with the wealth and fame that went along with it. 

Since the 1849 Gold Rush, California has become overwhelmingly prosperous and a place where people could indeed become prominent. California’s economy has grown to be the largest by GDP in the United States. If California were a country it would be the sixth largest economy in the world.⁶ The state’s 25 million acres of farmland produces 80 percent of the nation’s wine, two-thirds of the nation’s fruits and nuts and a third of its vegetables. The film industry adds $49 billion dollars to the state economy yearly and is one of the world’s leading producers of entertainment. And the Silicon Valley pioneers have created an industry that influences every aspect of daily life. Search engines, computers, phones and apps have changed how we retrieve information, how we communicate, and how we work and attend school.⁷ Given the overwhelming success of people who came to the state, why are so many people leaving California each day? 

Part 2 of this blog post will seek to answer that question. Beyond demographics, economics and history, the answer can be found in people’s theology. 

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¹ Arian Campo-Flores, Paul Overberg, et al,“The Pandemic Changed Where Americans Live,”The Wall Street Journal Online, 27 April 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/pandemic-supercharged-changes-in-where-americans-live-11619536399?mod=searchresults_pos8&page=1.

² Kathleen Ronayne, “California Losing Congressional Seat for First Time from Census Count,” KCRA 3 Website (posted from Associated Press), 26 April 2021, https://www.kcra.com/article/california-cesus-congressional-seat-lost/36255792.

³ Aaron Navarro, “Texas, North Carolina to gain congressional seats, according to 2020 Census” CBS News, 27 April 2021, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/census-2020-congressional-districts-states/. 

⁴ Campo-Flores, et. al, “Pandemic,” 27 April 2021.

⁵ Kevin Starr, California: A History (New York City: Modern Library Paperback, 2007).

⁶ Alex Gray, “ Which American State has a Bigger Economy than India? World Economic Forum, 08 July 2016, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/07/american-state-bigger-economy-than-india/.

⁷ Pat Evans, “16 Mind-Blowing Facts about California’s Economy,” Market Insider, 26 April 2019, https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/california-economy-16-mind-blowing-facts-2019-4-1028142608.