Mississippi is one of only a few states that saw an overall population decline in the most recent census data, and the report from the State Auditor’s Office found that the majority of those leaving the state are Millennials. Within three years of graduating from a local university, it was found that only half of graduates were still working in Mississippi. State Auditor Shad White says the state’s education investments and future workforce are being lost.
White says “It’s going to affect everyone in some kind of way, and we thought in the State Auditor's Office that it was important for taxpayers to know how much it’s costing us, and to put some data on this problem that’s going to be with us for some time unless we get serious about addressing it right now.”
White says while the state has been successful in retaining nurses and teachers, it is losing those trained careers such as in chemical engineering and business. Jake McGraw is Founder of Rethink Mississippi, an organization that lobbies for education improvements and curbing ‘brain drain’ in the state. He says many who move out of the state are moving to larger cities that have better infrastructure, more activities, and access to quality public school education.
McGraw says “My recipe for state government is really just to do the fundamentals that frankly they should be doing anyway. Fully funding public education, the second is infrastructure. I think a lot of the same logic that has a long-run effect on growth in the state, but it also creates good-paying jobs that are going to be based in the state for everybody from engineers to construction. And finally, healthcare.”
The state auditor’s report also finds that two-thirds of the state’s public university graduates work in just 10 Mississippi counties.
