St. Louis has the most severe population loss among major U.S. cities, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent population estimates.
The report, which was released Thursday, has St. Louis taking the top spot from San Francisco for the period from 2020 to 2024. St. Louis lost an estimated 21,700 residents during those four years. The city’s population was 301,371 in 2020.
That’s bad enough to rank sixth highest for population decline among U.S. cities of at least 20,000 residents.
Why is St. Louis shedding residents?
The decline is closely tied to the loss of families with children, said Ness Sandoval, a professor of sociology and demography at St. Louis University, who conducted the analysis. Young families are leaving for communities in the suburbs with better assets, such as parks and schools. Then, with fewer of those families in the region, those things get worse in the city.
“I think that probably the biggest one that we're talking about this past year is St. Louis Public Schools,” said Sandoval, pointing to the district’s transportation challenges and leadership scandals.
Another issue: Housing in the city is not aimed at families, Sandoval said.
“We are building lots of condos, a lot of apartments that are for single people, for double income, no kids,” Sandoval said. “The rents are extremely expensive.”
Single people are moving into the city, he added, but you need several to replace just one family, and that is a challenge.
Not just a city issue
The decline is a problem both for the city itself and the broader region because their fates are tied together, according to Sandoval.
“St. Louis city is the principal city of the region. It is the brand of the region,” he said. “If the region is going to recover and grow, the prerequisite is that St. Louis needs to recover and grow. That makes sense. We cannot, as a region, ignore St. Louis and say that it's not our problem. … You're starting to see population decline in some suburbs in our region, and even the Metro East, you see population decline.”
On the other side of the state, Kansas City saw the opposite trend and is now Missouri’s leader for population growth. There are an estimated 516,032 residents in Kansas City, up about 8,600 from 2020.
Kansas City has several advantages, Sandoval said: It’s a younger city and is more diverse, with a different government structure.
But that doesn’t mean the city can relax.
“Demographic transitions are coming to Kansas City as well,” he said. “If it's not proactive in 20, 30 years, it could be like St, Louis, and it could have more people dying than are born.”
Marissanne Lewis-Thompson contributed reporting to this story.
