Massachusetts is losing people to other states. What’s Gov. Healey’s plan to stem the tide?

Massachusetts lost more than 33,000 people to domestic outmigration last year, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates. It’s the latest marker in a trend of residents leaving for other states that began during the pandemic.

Gov. Maura Healey notes that, thanks to foreign immigration, the state’s population continues to grow.

But in an interview with WBUR’s Tiziana Dearing, Healey acknowledged the seriousness of the problem and laid out a plan to make Massachusetts a more attractive place to stick around.

Under Healey’s watch, the cost to buy a home in Massachusetts has continued to grow. In the most recent estimate from the Greater Boston Association Realtors, the median sale price of a single-family home in Greater Boston is over $900,000.

“Housing is just really expensive right now,” Healey said. “I talk to so many people – it’s not that they want to move out of Massachusetts, but they can’t afford a place.”

She notes that she signed a multibillion-dollar bond bill in 2024 aimed at boosting housing production. In addition to authorizing new borrowing for housing initiatives, the legislation trimmed regulations that made it harder to build in the state.

But Healey said she doesn't have a timeline for getting the median cost of a home in Massachusetts to level off or go down. “I can’t say that I have an actual number or date,” she said. “I can tell you I like the trend. We’ve made a lot of permitting changes and policy reforms.”

An analysis of census data by the conservative-leaning Pioneer Institute finds that Massachusetts is one of only four U.S. states with a net loss of private-sector jobs over the last five years. The state’s anchor industries, including biotechnology, healthcare, and higher education, have been buffeted by a changing economy and federal funding cuts.

“It doesn’t help when you have a federal administration that’s taking money out of our economy,” she said. “Defunding science, defunding research, which hits us hard here in Massachusetts with the kind of economy we have.”

She said she’s pivoting to invest more money in luring diverse industries to the state, including AI, robotics, quantum computing, and the defense sector.

“I see growth across the state in those areas, and a lot of potential,” she said. “But it’s a changing world. It’s a competitive world.”

Healey said she won’t rule out bolder moves, like tax cuts, to draw more people and capital to Massachusetts. But she worries that dramatic cuts would hurt the state’s ability to pay for public services and resources.

“We are among the safest states in the country. We have the second highest life expectancy. We have wonderful parks and playgrounds and natural spaces,” she said. “There's work to do, certainly, but there are assets that this state has that other states just don't have that make it a place where people want to come.”