California city leads nation in ‘baby bust’ as families flee urban centers

Children are disappearing from major cities, and urban centers in California are leading the trend.

The number of kids living in cities has fallen 6% nationwide over the past 10 years, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis, as families increasingly ditch big-city life for more affordable pastures.

San Jose, the Silicon Valley hub that’s home to some of the state’s most expensive real estate, has lost a staggering 20% of its population under 18 — coming in first on the list of cities that have lost the largest percentages of kids.

Even more dramatic, the number of kids under age 5 in San Jose has plummeted 34% in a decade, according to the report.

In Los Angeles, meanwhile, the number of children under 18 fell by 16% between 2015 and 2024.

Of the 25 cities that have lost the most children in that time frame, six were in California.

San Diego has lost 14% of its children while Fresno, Sacramento and San Francisco have lost 5%, 4% and 3% respectively, according to the analysis, which examined cities with more than 500,000 residents.

Falling birthrates — a nationwide trend, with the number of births falling by 9% over the past decade — are only one factor driving the disappearance of kids from major cities.

The Covid pandemic accelerated the flight of families choosing to leave cities in search of more space and affordable living, the report noted.

“Families had more exit options and they took them,” Connor O’Brien, a fellow at think tank the Institute for Progress, told the WSJ.

A handful of large cities, particularly in the Sun Belt, have bucked the trend and increased their share of kids.

The number of children in Fort Worth, Texas, and Jacksonville, Fla., increased by 11% over a decade, followed by Washington, D.C. and Seattle, which have each increased their kid populations by 10%.