Wisconsin's Population Expected to Decline by Nearly 200,000 Residents by 2050

Wednesday, January 8th, 2025 -- 10:00 AM

(Evan Casey, Wisconsin Radio Network) A new projection from the state found Wisconsin’s population is expected to decline by nearly 200,000 residents by 2050.

According to Evan Casey with the Wisconsin Radio Network, that’s largely due to declining birth rates and the aging of baby boomers, according to a Wisconsin Department of Administration report.

In 2020, the state’s population was 5,893,718. By 2050, that number is expected to decrease to 5,710,120, a decline of 183,598 residents. The report found the decline is largely due to the “changing age distribution” in Wisconsin.

“In coming decades, Wisconsin’s largest generation, the baby boomers, will enter higher-mortality age groups,” the report said. The projection expects the state’s population to remain stable from 2020 to 2030.

It’s then expected to decrease around 1 percent from 2030 to 2040, and just over 2 percent from 2040 to 2050. If the state were to maintain its population, it would “require a large unforeseen shift,” according to the report.

That could be a “large decrease in mortality; a large increase in fertility,” or an increase in new migration to the state. John Johnson, a researcher at Marquette University Law School, called the projection “sobering.”

“Anyone who’s looked at birth statistics knows that people in Wisconsin are having fewer and fewer babies, and we’re not a hot spot for migration,” Johnson told WPR.

Wisconsin’s population growth has stalled in recent years. A 2021 report from Forward Analytics found that from 2010 to 2020, Wisconsin’s population increased by 3.6 percent.

That’s the smallest increase in any 10-year period in the state’s history, according to the Forward Analytics report. Dale Knapp, the director of Forward Analytics, said the state projections aren’t necessarily surprising to him.

“The only way that we’re going to see some of these numbers turn around is people moving here, people coming to Wisconsin from other states or other countries,” Knapp said.

Knapp said population decline will add to the state’s workforce shortage. That could be worse in the northern part of the state, Knapp said, where the projection found 16 counties across the state are expected to see a 15 percent or more population decline by 2050.

“Many of them are tourist counties,” Knapp said. “The workforce challenge is going to be enormous.” Johnson also said there will be a higher demand for services for older people in the coming years as more Baby Boomers retire.

“Those services will be harder to provide, because there will be fewer working age people to provide for them,” Johnson said.

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