1M ESCAPE FROM NY

Better economy spurs metro flight

More people are leaving the New York region than any other major metropolitan area in the country.

More than 1 million more people moved out of the area than moved in since 2010, a rate of 4.4 percent — the highest negative net migration rate among the nation’s large population centers, US Census records show.

The number of people leaving the region — which includes parts of New Jersey, Connecticut, the lower Hudson Valley and Long Island — in one year swelled from 187,034 in 2015 to 223,423 in 2016, while the number of international immigrants settling in the tri-state area dropped from 181,551 to 160,324 over the same period, records show.

The nation’s economy is improving, there are more jobs in cheaper places to live and retirees are choosing to move to warmer climates, experts say.

“The historical trend is that out migration grows when economy is getting better,” said Empire Center for Public Policy research director E.J. McMahon.

“As the economy gets better there are more jobs outside the region and by the same token . . . more people to buy your house if you’re a baby boomer looking to move to Boca Raton or Myrtle Beach.”

The New York metro area remains the nation’s most populous with 23.7 million residents.

Americans have been increasingly relocating from the East and the Rust Belt to cities in Florida, Texas and the Northwest.

The Orlando-Daytona Beach, Fla., area attracted 217,104 Americans over the past six years, a growth rate of 7.7 percent.

Denver had the second highest rate of domestic migrants (6.3), according to census records compiled by the Empire Center.

The population of the New York region still grew 2.7 percent from 2010 to 2016, thanks to foreign arrivals and births, records show.

New York City, the main driver of the region’s population, is on track to have 8.6 million people by 2020, from a current population of 8.5 million, according to July 2016 records.

Some 422,045 people — or 4.3 percent — have left Chicago since 2010, the second highest negative migration rate after New York’s.