This one map shows the fastest-growing and fastest-shrinking counties in the US - March 31, 2023 at 08:04AM

Washington State University, located in Whitman County, Washington, the fastest-growing large county in the US.

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Whitman County, Washington, was the fastest-growing US county based on a year’s worth of data.
The Census Bureau released population estimates for counties for July 1, 2022, along with other county data.
Many counties that are in the middle of US, like in Kansas, saw some decline in their population.

Southern and western counties keep growing while many northern counties in states like New York and Pennsylvania are shrinking, the latest Census population growth data suggests.

The Census Bureau released county-level population estimates for July 1, 2022, along with net migration and natural change estimates for counties, on Thursday.

“After some of the nation’s most populous counties experienced significant outmigration and population declines in 2021, overall patterns of population growth and decline are moving towards pre-pandemic rates for the nation’s 3,144 counties,” a news release from the Census Bureau on Thursday stated.

Insider calculated the percent change from July 1, 2021, to July 1, 2022, for the various populations. You can hover over the map below to see the populations during these two years and the percent change based on these population estimates.

Many counties that fall in the middle of the country saw a decline from July 1, 2021, to July 1, 2022. For instance, Greeley County and Stanton County in Kansas saw their populations fall. North Dakota also had many of its counties see their populations tumble, including Towner County and Mountrail County.

All of Maine’s counties saw an increase. Almost every county in Idaho saw its population climb between 2021 and 2022.

Additionally, Christine Hartley, assistant division chief for estimates and projections in the Census Bureau’s population division, said “many counties with large universities saw their populations fully rebound this year as students returned” per the news release.

That includes Whitman County, Washington, which led the way for population growth among counties. The release noted this county is “home to Washington State University.” It also noted that this comes after the county saw its population tumble by 9.6% between July 1, 2020, and July 1, 2021.

Below are the counties that saw their populations spike the most among areas that had populations of at least 20,000 in July 1, 2021, and July 1, 2022.

Based on percent changes, Whitman County was the only county that saw growth in the double digits.

Additionally, among these 10 large counties with the highest percent increases were five Texas counties. For instance, Kaufman County in Texas saw the second-highest percent increase among the counties with populations of at least 20,000. Dawson County and Lumpkin County in Georgia were the two Georgia counties that were among the 10 fastest-growing large counties. They saw percent increases of 5.8%.

Four parishes (the state’s equivalent to counties) in Louisiana saw the largest percent declines among the counties with populations of at least 20,000 in both years. The following are the large counties that saw the largest percent declines during this time frame.

In addition to the four Louisiana parishes, two Florida counties were among the 10 counties with the largest declines, including Baker County. However, Lassen County in California had the greatest percent decline among these large counties, falling by 6.0%.

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