More Angelenos Look To Move Away, USC Survey Finds

LOS ANGELES, CA — A whopping 10 percent of Angelenos plan to head for greener pastures over the next year, according to a USC survey that found residents in Los Angeles are less satisfied than the average American.

The USC Dornsife- Union Bank LABarometer livability survey released Wednesday found that the pandemic is driving a potential exodus from the City of Angels with 40 percent more people planning to leave than in 2019. Kyla Thomas, director of LABarometer, USC Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research said the findings are a troubling reflection of the hardships of daily life in Los Angeles County.

"The 40% increase in the number of people who plan to leave Los Angeles in the coming year, however, raises a red flag," she said. "It's also worrisome that the gap in life satisfaction between L.A. County and the national average has grown."

The findings weren't all gloom and doom for Los Angeles. Though residents are less satisfied with their quality of life compared to people throughout California and the nation, they did register an uptick in consumer confidence, and they perceived less crime, vandalism, and drug and alcohol use in their neighborhoods compared to two years ago.

The survey of 1,800 Los Angeles County residents found that on a scale of one to seven, the average life satisfaction in L.A. County is 4.3 compared to the national and statewide average of 4.7. That gap is twice what it was in 2019.

And while more residents are looking to leave Los Angeles County than in the past, 14 percent of those surveyed are planning to relocate to new housing somewhere else in the county in the upcoming year.

Consumer confidence in L.A. County is rising, while it has stalled throughout the rest of California and the U.S. On a scale of zero to 100, where higher numbers denote more positive assessments of the economy, consumer confidence in L.A. County (50.3) remains slightly lower than the entire state of California (50.9) and the U.S. (51.8), the study shows.

That said, it has risen sharply since at least the middle of last year, while statewide and throughout the country, consumer confidence has stalled. The 50.3 consumer confidence measurement in L.A. County is down 3.3 points from June 2019 but up 2.7 from June 2020.

"Five months after our first LABarometer livability survey, everyone's lives were upended by COVID-19," said Thomas. "Our latest findings, which reflect the experiences of L.A. County residents during the peak of the pandemic, reveal reasons for optimism as well as concern."

Thomas said it was encouraging that "perceptions of neighborhood crime are down and that consumer confidence in Los Angeles is rising, even as confidence has stalled in other parts of the state and nation."

City News Service contributed to this report.