What does a college town look like?

[caption id="attachment_1782" align="aligncenter" width="550" class=" "] Image Source: Chapel Hill/Orange County Visitors Bureau[/caption] Though migration is a hard event to capture, there is rich data—60 years of it, in fact!—for every county in the United States, courtesy of the “Net Migration Patterns for US Counties” project at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Nearly every geography has a unique migration profile that can be differentiated by age, race, and gender. These profiles tell us a…

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Majority of NC-born adults still live here

By on 8.11.14 in Migration

As I’ve discussed before, North Carolina is an attractive state to both individuals born here and those born elsewhere. The state’s attractiveness stems from a wide range of educational and employment opportunities, coupled with good quality of life and relatively affordable cost-of-living. North Carolina’s high population growth has been fueled by net migration. Net migration statistics are calculated by subtracting the number of individuals moving away from North Carolina (out-migration) from the number of individuals…

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Religion in North Carolina: Southern Baptists dominate, Catholicism and non-denominational affiliation rising

According to the most recent U.S. Religion Census, conducted in 2010, about half of the U.S. population (49% or nearly 151 million persons) are adherents to some religion. Nationwide, the largest denominational affiliation is Catholicism, with an estimated 59 million adherents. While Protestantism as a group has more than 77 million adherents, it is comprised of dozens of individual denominations. Among these, the Southern Baptist Convention is the second largest religious group in the United…

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College Bound: Out-of-State Students

By on 5.13.14 in Education

Across the 16 universities in the UNC system, the proportion of incoming first-year students from out-of-state varies widely. Between 2009 and 2013, for example, nearly three-fifths of incoming first-year students at the UNC School of the Arts were from out-of-state; at the other extreme, only 4% at UNC Pembroke were from outside of North Carolina. Among the five largest schools, UNC Chapel Hill has the highest percentage of out-of-state students (17%), followed by East Carolina…

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Sweet Home Carolina

By on 4.7.14 in Migration

North Carolina is a sticky state; only Texas is stickier. (And I’m not talking about humidity.) “Sticky” states have a high percentage of adults who were born in the state still living there. Just as migration patterns highlight the relative appeal of a location—individuals tend to move to areas with greater opportunities and away from those without them—“stickiness” may be another gauge of an area’s attractiveness. The same educational and employment opportunities that bring people…

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5 things you need to know about the 2013 county population estimates

In the three years following the 2010 Census, North Carolina’s population grew by nearly 313,000 residents. With today’s release of the 2013 county population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, we can now examine where in the state this growth occurred. Here’s what you need to know: 1. Charlotte and the Triangle accounted for 67% of NC population growth. Two-thirds of state population growth occurred in the 12 counties that make up the Charlotte and…

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Why do people move to North Carolina?

By on 1.28.14 in Migration

For more than twenty years, migration has fueled North Carolina’s growth. People move from other states and countries to go to school, to work, and to retire throughout the state. Between 1990 and 2010, North Carolina gained more than 2 million new residents due to migration. New Census Bureau estimates for July 1, 2013 total population show that migration continues to drive North Carolina’s population growth: 175,000 people moved into the state since 2010, accounting…

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4 Amazing Interactive Maps

1. World Births and Deaths in Real-Time Mathematician and software developer Brad Lyon previously developed a statistical simulation of the geographic location of US births and deaths and an interactive visualization that marked these events in real-time. Recently, he took the simulation and visualization global. Worldwide, more than 4 births and nearly 2 deaths occur each second. Lyon uses country-specific data to simulate both the timing and location of global births and deaths. The interactive…

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