Florida overtakes New York as the state with the most Puerto Ricans

New York is not the state with the largest population of Puerto Ricans in the United States.

According to the most recent Census data that compiles information on U.S. citizens and residents, Florida is now the territory with the most Puerto Ricans.

The change indicates that more than 80,000 Puerto Ricans left the Big Apple between 2010 and 2020, as 1,070,558 people said they were Puerto Ricans in New York in 2010, and that number dropped to 990,217 in 2020.

There are many reasons for Puerto Ricans to fly from New York, among them the high cost of housing. In the decade between one census and the next, Big Apple residents have seen several increases in rental prices.

New York is a rental city where two-thirds of the population rents. In 2022, an analysis by real estate firms Samuel Miller and Douglas found that the median rent in New York was $5,058 per month, a 29% increase from the previous year.

Before that, the Rent Stabilization Board, which regulates the rents of thousands of people nicknamed Sleepless, approved increases to 5% on two-year leases and 3.2% on one-year leases.

Carlos Vargas-Ramos, director of public policy at the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at the City University of New York, confirmed that the number of Puerto Rican students at the institution has declined. NY”.

Experts attribute the flight of Puerto Ricans from the Big Apple to several factors, including higher housing and living costs in the city and better job opportunities for Puerto Ricans in other states.

“There is no doubt that the increase in the cost of living in New York City has been enormous. And, thanks to the academic achievement of Puerto Rican students, many of them find better job opportunities outside of New York. Then, they go to seek their fortunes in Texas, Virginia, North Carolina, etc., where a university degree can be more lucrative. ,” he said.

But while thousands of Puerto Ricans have left New York, most of them have not fled back to the island. Also, according to the Census, the population of Puerto Rico has decreased from 3,725,789 in 2010 to 3,285,874 in 2020.

That number represents a population loss of 11.8% less than the entire United States.

Separately, Vargas Ramos and demographer Judith Rodriguez agree that the factors leading to population loss in Puerto Rico are immigration and low birth rates. The latter is a problem both classified as serious.

“It’s serious, serious… We have a problem, nobody is pursuing an important ‘problem’… That’s what determines how many young people we’re going to have if we have to close. What’s going to happen to schools, to the country. It’s going to have very serious implications. We’re going to have fewer people. There will be, we will have less human resources in the future,” Rodriguez said of Puerto Rico’s low birth rate.

Don’t get me started, the number of Puerto Ricans in Florida has grown significantly over the past 10 years, with 300,000 more Puerto Ricans coming to live in the southern state than were registered in 2010.

Puerto Ricans in Florida now number 1,239,809; That’s up from 1,070,558 in New York a decade ago.

Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Massachusetts are other states that have recorded increases in their Puerto Rican population.