Utah has grown by over 60,000 people in the past year, according to new estimates from the Kem C. Garner Policy Institute at the University of Utah.
62% of those people moved here -— the highest level in state history. The other 38% are babies born to people already living here. Utah had the lowest natural increase since 1975. Natural increase refers to births minus deaths.
Mallory Bateman is the director of demographic research and state data center coordinator for the Kem C. Gardner Institute. She noted that net migration, which subtracts people moving out of Utah from people moving in, was record-breaking.
“There are 38,000 new residents, which is actually the highest that we’ve had since World War II, which is a little wild,” Bateman said.
Wasatch County is the second-fastest growing county in the state, with its population increasing nearly 4% between July of 2021 and July of 2022. On a percentage basis, Iron County increased the most at a little over 4% during that period.
But Utah County is the area that added the most people, with almost 24,000 new residents.
Summit County’s population grew 1%, just slightly ahead of Salt Lake County’s percentage of growth.
In terms of raw numbers, Summit County grew by over 400 people, and Wasatch County grew by nearly 1,400. Salt Lake County added almost 10,000.
Almost all of Wasatch County’s new residents moved there, whereas Summit County’s increase was about half migration and half natural increase.
Bateman said the institute expects a cooldown next year, due to economic impacts such as higher home prices and mortgage rates, and possible recessionary effects from the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. All of those make it more difficult for people to move here from out-of-state.
“A lot of the construction has slowed,” Bateman said. “From permit to completion, that timeline has extended quite a bit. So if we don’t have new houses for people to move into, then that makes it a little more challenging for people to be moving here.”
A long-term population report published last year by Kem Gardner showed the state’s population growing by two-thirds in the next four decades.
In that same timeframe, Summit County’s population is expected to grow 40%. Wasatch County is projected to have Utah’s second highest population growth come 2060, at over 130%. The trajectories indicate that sometime between 2030 and 2040, Wasatch County will outgrow Summit County.
In recent years, Utah has led the United States in population growth.
The estimates show the state's total population at 3.4 million people.
