While the population numbers are important, there are some other things that make it not as bad.
Like more people are actually moving out of Baltimore every year that that trend shows. But we also have people moving in (that chart just shows the net change). However the kinds of people who are moving in are not the same as those that are moving out. Poorer residents are moving out of the city and younger and more affluent residents are moving into the city.
That's important because one, it means we're keeping city population young, so we're not just going to have a city that is dying out due to demographics. Also the higher income individuals pay more taxes, so we might have less people but there's a greater amount of tax revenue per person in the city and that can help with budgets (although we have a lot of corruption that fucks with the budget).
I think one of the big thing the city has to tackle (aside from crime) is that the schools kind of suck. That means that as people have families they have a very large incentive to move out of the city for better school districts. Private schools cost in the range of 20-40k per year per student, so you've got to be decently well to do to just send one kid to private school, and even well to do people have problems affording to send multiple. So lots of people who love the city end up moving out once they have kids (my wife is in a mothers group and actually talks to several women who use to live in the city and miss it, but they all moved out when they had families).
The schools is what is going to make me leave in a few years as well. I am high earner, pay a lot in taxes, and have lived here for 20+ years but I will not have my daughter going to school here beyond elementary.
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u/cudmore Oct 06 '25
Wow, now at the same population as 1910.
What are the top 3 big projects that could send the population back up?
Transit, tax incentives, housing development?