New York City has significantly fewer children and teenagers than it did before the coronavirus pandemic spurred an exodus of families to the suburbs and other states, according to an analysis of new census data released Thursday.
The number of New Yorkers under the age of 20 fell by 9 percent — or more than 186,000 people — to 1.8 million in 2023 from just three years earlier, according to Social Explorer, a data research company that analyzed the census estimates.
It was the biggest drop in at least a decade in the city’s under-20 population. The decrease could potentially affect the city’s education policies and public school system, which is the largest in the United States, and could eventually help shape the city’s work force and economy. That age group has been steadily shrinking in the city since at least 2010 even as older age groups have been growing.
Though the census estimates do not offer an explanation for the demographic changes, many families with children, including many Black families, have moved out of the city in recent years because of a shortage of affordable housing, a shift to work-from-home policies, concerns about school quality and crime and a desire for more parks and open spaces, among other reasons.
All five boroughs lost residents under the age of 20, with Brooklyn losing 66,000 younger residents; Queens losing 53,000; the Bronx 41,000; Manhattan 22,000; and Staten Island nearly 4,000.
The suburbs surrounding New York City also lost younger residents, but those drops were more modest. Long Island lost nearly 18,000 residents under age 20, while New Jersey suburbs lost nearly 40,000 younger residents.
Andrew A. Beveridge, a former sociology professor at Queens College and president of Social Explorer, said the decline in younger residents in New York City is likely to be offset in part by the influx of more than 200,000 migrants since the spring of 2022, which includes many families with children.
Still, he added, the city is facing a major demographic shift that could have far-reaching consequences, including fewer students in the schools. “It means that people in New York are less likely to be families with kids and that has all sorts of implications,” he said.
The drop was steepest among the city’s youngest residents, with the number of children under the age of 5 falling by 17 percent — or more than 92,000 people — to 445,000 from more than 537,000 in 2020, according to the analysis.
City planning officials said that the decrease in the under-5 population most likely reflected a decline in the number of births in the city and the country since the pandemic.
Officials also cautioned against drawing exact conclusions from the latest census estimates, saying that it was difficult to precisely estimate the populations of age groups and that these particular figures were based on a blend of 2010 and 2020 census numbers, in part because of the added challenge of collecting data during the pandemic and because of privacy concerns when measuring smaller groups.
The New York City public school system has shrunk to roughly 915,000 students from 1.1 million a decade ago. In the 2021-22 school year alone, nearly 58,000 students left the system to attend schools outside the city, according to Education Department data — by far the highest number in more than a decade.
Asian students were more likely to move to Long Island, children in poverty were more likely to head to Pennsylvania and many Black families left for the South, the data shows.
The decline in children has hit urban public school districts across the nation, and has profound ramifications for New York. Many principals will grapple with tough decisions over their budgets in the coming years. Some face the prospect of school mergers or consolidations — one of the most painful issues for families.
And as Mayor Eric Adams cuts millions from the city’s popular free prekindergarten initiative, many City Council members have worried that the uncertainty could drive even more families away. Dozens of parents have said in interviews in recent months that steep rents and the costs of raising children are prompting them to rethink their futures in New York.
The City Council speaker, Adrienne Adams, said last month that the troubles in the city’s child care sector were pushing working-class and middle-income families “to the brink” and “leaving many to feel they have no choice but to leave the city to provide their children with a better life.”
