Kelly Asche is a senior researcher for the Mankato-based Center for Rural Policy and Development. The Minneapolis Star Tribune recently published an editorial from him on migration among rural and urban counties in Minnesota…

Every year, we at the Center for Rural Policy and Development track population, migration and economic trends throughout rural Minnesota. Most of the time, the updates I make are minor. These kinds of trends tend to change slowly. But every once in a while, some large event occurs that knocks these slow-changing trends sideways or intensifies them. The pandemic was one such event.

During the pandemic, net migration to Hennepin and Ramsey counties took a huge hit. In greater Minnesota, though, net migration stayed positive and even accelerated, including in the most rural regions of the state.

Now, it’s important to understand that net migration is the net sum of people leaving and coming into an area. If more people move into an area than leave it, then it’s a positive net migration. So, with this data we can’t actually conclude that people were “fleeing” the inner urban areas for the suburbs and rural areas because of, fill in the blank here: the pandemic, crime, cost of living, etc. Drawing this conclusion only muddies the narrative and ignores two main facts.

First, using data from the New York Fed, the extreme negative net migration that happened in Ramsey and Hennepin counties during the pandemic was driven largely by folks not moving into those counties rather than a significant increase in residents leaving them. Yes, the rate of people moving out compared with previous years did increase slightly during the pandemic, but much more significant was the lower number of people who moved into those counties in 2020 and 2021.

Second, the pandemic only intensified the net migration trends that were already in place. So the question isn’t whether migration trends changed because of the pandemic, but rather if the pandemic just sharpened the direction they were already going for a bit and will they ultimately go back to what they were before: a slow-moving upward trend for greater Minnesota and the suburbs and a modest negative trend for Hennepin and Ramsey counties.

Researchers think of population migration in terms of push-and-pull factors that may “push” a family out of one community or “pull” them toward another. These forces can be different depending on a person’s priorities at that particular time of life. For someone in their 20s, they might feel a strong pull to the location of a college, their first career opportunity, or an exciting, youthful nightlife. As they get older, a house, a school district and day care availability might be more important.