Let's compare 3 states: Florida, Michigan, and California. In each instance, the map to the left is the state's population change between 2010 and 2019, and the map to the right is the change between 2020 and 2021.
![Image](https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8a184113a312d9fa6974c026f729fdc8ad3e0c6297670e9143a2fdb78c5f715a.png)
![Image](https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9399c0fb80381deeb9d8c37e2d2b0e09cb21faaf9da2603124f48695a14f69cd.png)
![Image](https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/05cc24e08bc4f8b25e043b7f69110c7c30f5e5d3add56f6cc8a52c807743c6cd.png)
https://usafacts.org/
For reference, the overall national growth between 2010 and 2019 was 7.0% and between 2020 and 2021 it was 0.1%. Obviously the smaller than average population growth from 2020 to 2021 was due to Covid deaths, but we still had a net gain in overall population.
A few things that jump out at me looking over these maps:
-Florida's population grew at 10x the national average between 2020 and 2021 and was even doing well prior to that at 2x. But even in a state with overall growth, a few areas had significant losses - Miami, Orlando, and Fort Lauderdale (all run by Democrats, btw), despite those places having significant growth prior to Covid.
-Michigan has been sucking for over 10 years now. But where there were changes post-Covid, it was people leaving the big cities and moving into the northern lower peninsula and even into the u.p..
-California had a lot of growth post-Covid in certain areas, but that was more than undone by people leaving a few key places in droves, namely in Los Angeles which alone lost nearly 160,000 people. and L.A. was growing significantly pre-Covid.
As an aside, I find it fascinating that TC Talks makes a big deal out of DeSantis allegedly scaring away 2,000 jobs from Florida, but is mum on the politicians in Los Angeles scaring away 160,000 residents.