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Utah population booming

The growth can be attributed to the safe haven status and financial support given to illegals by Utahs city's and towns. This is not an indication of good growth, dependent growth that the tax payers of Utah are faced with. Jobs for illegals is rampant and uncontrolled in Utah and there is no hope for the americans in Utah to get any relief or job security. These illegals are more of a burden to taxpayers that has no benificial outcome as indicatiors of growth. Bragging as purveors of treasonous support and a haven for all the mexican illegals is not something to be proud of, it is disgusting and immoral to classify illegal growth as an indication of a good economy. It is if you are an illegal alien where jobs are plentiful and they are good at displacing and putting the real americans out of jobs and an income. These population growth statistics should segregate the growth of the numbers of illegals seperately and not as growth in a good economic sense. Illegal growth is not good growth, it is negative growth.

Utah�s increased population growth data can be misleading especially when spun as �an indication of how well [Utah�s] economy is doing to draw people in for jobs,� and �people � coming � is an indication that the economy is making room." This rhetoric masks Utah�s �get by� political economic grip on the working poor, which sustains Utah�s very small controlling bourgeois. By way of example, Californians migrating to Utah after selling their $400K to $1MM California homes and purchasing new Utah homes for cash at 1/3 those prices, does little to rectify overall state poverty and working poor conditions, with well paying jobs. They are not moving here because Utah has great jobs. The majority of Utah�s jobs are $7 - $15 per hr., no benefits, etc., leading to no prospective rising material standards of living. If Utah�s design of low paying jobs in indicative of a dynamic progressive spontaneous economy benefiting the entire population, then Keynesian economics v. laissez-faire economic liberalism needs to be re-written.

Now all we need is a new 8 lane north-south freeway then we will be all set.

All major social problems stem from over-population.
Fasten your seat belts.
Things are going to get bumpy.

It's a Pretty Great State!

Your article was highly informative and made me look at Utah's population increase of 120,039, from July 2006 to July 2007, in a different way. I noticed in a recent publication that this number almost exactly represents the total population of the second largest city in Utah - West Valley City! [NIBLICK DEVELOPMENT, INC - City: West Valley City Pop: 120,327 - DATE: 9 Aug 07] Now that's some growth! Thanks for the update. A most excellent read!

Thanks for a good, informative article. It's amazing to read the comments, also. Some folks are so stuck in their ideological bent that if Utah didn't get snow, they might blame it on "illegals". Give it a rest, please. You really don't help your cause. And then there's "Anonymous" who thinks "over-population" will inevitably lead to "major social problems". I've lived in several of the largest cities of the world and Utah is far from over-populated, and far from the social ills about which "Anonymous" should be concerned. Look at the bright side.... please! There's a lot there to see.

Utah! You are a desert! You don't have any water! Grow as large as you like but stop making everybody else in the country subsidize your golf courses and sprawl.

I love your optimistic look "Glass half full"
But today's Pollyanna attitude is naive at best.
Developers must develop ... or go under. That left turn that takes so long to make will take longer next year. Live with it. It's a numbers thing.
Enjoy the (relatively) "undevelopment."
We are in the age of overbreed and nothing can stop it.

Sometimes when looking at percentages only we may get confused. If you have a population of 5 and you get one more that is about 20% but if you have a population of 1 and an increase of 1 you have 100% but both were only a real increase of 1. The doubling of a population in a one room place is certainly more of an impact of adding the same 1 person to a big home.

The article shows Utah gaining 66,795, California 300,000 and Texas 500,000. Utah has the highest percentace because of the lowest population, CA is lower in % because they have a higher population before.

The real impact depends on a lot of things including the area of land avilable, what it is like, jobs available, money & resources available. It may (or may not) be harder for Utah to provide schools etc. for 67M than it is for TX to provide for 700M & the same thing for jobs. It obviously takes more new jobs to support the real growth in TX & CA.

Some growth is good, not all growth is good in my opinion. Maybe some people don't want to be first?

To "Voice of Reason" -- Yes, Utah is a desert. And we have some golf courses . . . but not as many as our neighbors in Nevada, Arizona and California (all of which steal Utah water). Just ask "the Snake" Harry Reid about his plan to steal water from Snake Valley for his Las Vegas golf courses.
And while you're talking about everybody else in the country "subsidizing" Utah, remember that over 70% of Utah is owned by the federal government and is not subject to taxation. They don't pay for basic services like police protection, Sheriff search and rescue, schools, feeding poor people, etc. They don't even care for the illegal aliens they have allowed to migrate to Utah and be supported by our schools, hospitals and other infrastructure. Also, the funds for the interstate highway system have all but dried up, so they don't pay to build many roads anymore, either. If PEOPLE and BUSINESSES owned more of that property, you'd better believe that they'd be contributing to the State's funding needs. So when you visit our beautiful state some day, please remember that it is really UTAH CITIZENS who are subsidizing YOU!

Bob G - Growth figures are based on out-of-state driver's licenses that are surrendered--not a guess of how many illegals moved here. It's a bit difficult for an illegal to surrender an out-of-state driver's license, eh? Maybe, just maybe, some of this growth can be attributed to a baby boom generation that is on the cusp of retirement and want to relocate from elsewhere. And, maybe some of the boomers are LDS that are 'coming home to roost', so to speak. But illegals? Nah. And, btw, there is no such thing as 'negative growth'.

And Voice of reason--please explain how everybody else in the country is subsidizing our golf courses.

Yo, Sleuth--if, in point of fact, it is Californians that are moving here and buying homes for cash, it ain't gonna hurt the economy. They have to pay property taxes, use local businesses, and generally increase employment via ancillary services.

Moved back here because of the smog, traffic, gangs, grafitti and congestion in California.

Didn't have a million dollar home. Bought a home of equal value here. Now retired. Spending California earned money to pay for Utah's needs.

Utah's income tax is double what I paid in California. Didn't pay taxes on groceries in California.

Half of my neighbors came from other states and are also retired. Non of us came because of jobs. We came because of the quality of life.

My weight has dropped 30 pounds, my pulse has dropped 10 points to 62 and my blood pressure is now 116 over 73. Not bad for a 66 year old. That is what quality of life can do for you.

I left Utah 27 years ago, and I've never looked back. I plain and simply could not make a decent lving there. I hear it's a bit better now, but I seriously doubt people are moving to Utah because of job growth. More likely it is retired people moving back and immigration (legal and illegal). I enjoy visiting family members in Utah, but give me 2-3 days, and I'm anxious to leave again. The incredible schism between LDS and non-LDS is really unfortunate. I had great friends of both persuasions. I believe that much of the hate-filled stuff that is regularly posted to these boards is the result of a few people, not a majority on either side. I wish all you good folks in Utah a great New Year.

Have you noticed that every graduating class is bigger than the one before it?
What is everyone going to do?
Flip burgers?

Reading DesNews online = Looking back.

Man has the tendency to put off certain disagreeing facts until the last possible moment.
There is an obvious population explosion in the world today and like it or not is unstoppable.

At one time all the candidates for the Cache County Council ran on a platform that for growth. There was nobody I could vote against. I eventually left Cache Valley when it became so crowded that I couldn't get through Logan in 10 minutes, when the fishing streams got so crowded that all my favorite places were taken most evenings, when Logan began looking like any other city in the U.S. with Home Depot forcing out Anderson's Lumber, Wal-Mart forcing out a myriad of small shops, etc. I still miss the golf courses up there but the cost of golfing skyrocketed during my stay in the valley. I fear that a similar change will alter the lifestyle of the Wasatch Front. With growth comes many problems, and with the state's left fighting the right, the growth will not be accommodated properly. Look how the Sierra Club and Mayor Rocky Anderson were successful in delaying the construction of roads designed to handle the greater traffic flow. Those types will fight, fight, fight to prevent services from being provided to an ever-expanding population. If they could, they would stop population growth, but that's beyond their power. Utah is becoming another California.

I saw Utah before its population hit one million. Life was better then. Life was nearly ideal except for the winters.

I just read the old whine about Rocky and stopping highways. It's a shame that hate blinds you. UDOT made the mistake. Before you build anything you do a risk matrix. Educated people want to know what their liabilities will be before they waste time and money. If you needed federal highway funds and you're in the business of construction you should know you need environmental impact studies.

Utah will never be another California. You can't export the climate. I live in Sacramento now. I don't care what the mayor of LA or San Francisco does in those cities. Whine in Utah is Rocky. Here it's Cabernet.

You hit the nail on the head. Why would I not change plans to return to Utah? Utah will have all California's problems an a cold miserable climate and no beaches.

anyone who travels I-15 in Davis County knows the population is booming. even daytime hours are miserable. we all know what a joke it is during commute hours. And we're still ONE YEAR AWAY from "commuter rail" (diesel smoke belching heavy rail) and the tree-huggers 55mph parkway of Legacy. heaven help Davis County