PORTLAND — More people left Oregon than moved into the state in 2022, a reversal of growth trends that had endured since the 1980s.

The new U.S. Census Bureau numbers mark the first time Oregon saw more people leaving than arriving since a housing crash in the early 1980s caused a sharp recession in the state.

Oregon’s timber-dependent economy of the time meant it was among the hardest-hit states. That recession was the state’s deepest until the COVID-19 pandemic, and it took the better part of a decade for the state to regain the jobs lost.

At that time, the state saw five years of net negative migration, according to the Oregon Office of Economic Analysis.

Today’s population decline comes in the wake of the COVID-19 recession, which upended the workforce as remote work introduced people to the possibility of working from anywhere.

Portland was among the urban centers that saw unusually large flows of residents leaving during this time. While many cities, like Seattle and Fort Worth, saw reversals in population losses after the first full year of the pandemic, Portland continued to shed residents and was among the fastest shrinking big cities in 2022.

Nearly 158,000 people packed up and left Oregon in 2022, which is roughly 33,000 more people leaving than the year before, census data shows. Meanwhile, Oregon saw about 128,000 newcomers from other states.

The exodus spanned all race and ethnic groups that showed any statistically significant migration.

The numbers also showed that Oregon lost residents across nearly all age groups in 2022, but saw an uptick in net out-migration among children and adults between the ages of 35 and 55. That suggests many families moved away.

The median income of Oregonians who left the state last year was just over $42,000, while newcomers had a median income of $36,000.

The out-migration trend began a year earlier in Multnomah County, which saw an 11% increase in moves out of state in 2022 than the previous year.

Census figures released in late December showed that Oregon’s population dropped in 2022 for the first time in decades. The state ranked sixth in the U.S. among the fastest shrinking states, both in percentage and numeric declines.

As of last year, the state had 4.24 million residents, according to the Census Bureau estimates.