The Great Migration’s lasting billion-dollar impact on Arizona

Article originally posted on Phoenix Business Journal on October 4, 2024

The Great Migration brought billions of dollars in wealth to the Phoenix metro, according to a recent Business Journal analysis.

The trend, spurred on by remote work policies adopted by many companies during the Covid-19 pandemic, has largely tapered off after a furious stretch during the pandemic’s peak.

But not before wealth swelled in the Valley from a rush of new tax filers.

Maricopa County was one of the largest beneficiaries of the Great Migration, netting $1.8 billion of adjusted gross income from new tax filers in 2021 and 2022, according to data from the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Census Bureau. The Valley’s largest county added 96,229 tax returns during that stretch with a combined AGI of more than $9.5 billion. During the same span, 89,247 tax returns worth nearly $7.7 billion departed the county.

The average income per tax return from those new arrivals was $98,820 in Maricopa County, which ranked No. 10 in the nation between 2021 and 2022 with a net addition of 6,982 new tax returns. Polk County in Florida’s Lakeland metro was the strongest in the country by this metric, adding a net 12,108 tax returns between 2021 and 2022.

Pinal County ranked No. 2 among Arizona counties for net gain in AGI, adding nearly $635 million from 2021 to 2022. That topped No. 3 Pima County ($407M), No. 4 Yavapai County ($384M) and No. 5 Mohave County ($300M).

Find Complete Article Here: https://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2024/10/04/covid-pandemic-great-migration-over-housing.html