Perhaps more significantly, the number of people leaving the state has also dropped. For instance, the number of moves from Illinois to California dropped from 1,403 to 1,208. Moves to Arizona and, surprisingly, Texas were off, too, although the number of moving trucks headed from here to Florida grew from 1,336 to 1,544.
Moves within the Chicago Fed district—to or from Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin—fluctuated a bit, but generally shifted no more than two percentage points.
Still, there are signs that metro Chicago is losing people to the great interior with the number of moves to non-metro areas growing at 5% in 2020-21. And the share of moves that were outbound grew from 65.5% to 67.9%.
One caveat: Many people don’t use a moving company, instead renting and loading a moving truck themselves. Also, keep in mind that the pattern of seniors moving to warmer areas has existed for decades, which could explain some of the warm-weather moves. Regardless, politicians on all sides will have some fun with these numbers.
