Texas is home to second largest population of millionaires in the U.S.

The Millionaires Club

73,930 Texans were classified as millionaire tax filers in 2022. Photo via Getty Images

Tilman Fertitta, Elon Musk, Alice Walton, and Jerry Jones are members of the billionaires club in Texas. But just how many millionaires does the Lone Star State boast?

Altogether, 73,930 Texans were classified as millionaire tax filers in 2022, according to an analysis of IRS data by digital marketing firm Hennessey Digital. (For context, that millionaire count is just a few thousand shy of the entire population of Missouri City.) This figure puts Texas in the No. 2 spot for the country’s biggest population of millionaire taxpayers, behind first-place California.

However, if you crunch the figures a different way, Texas’ millionaire status isn’t quite as impressive, demonstrating that not everything is bigger in Texas. Texas ranks 10th among the states with the highest proportions of millionaire taxpayers, the study indicates. According to Hennessey Digital’s calculations, 27.1 of every 10,000 Texas tax filers reported adjusted gross income of at least $1 million for the 2022 tax year.

“The state’s booming economy, driven by energy, technology, and business-friendly policies, contributes to its wealthy population,” says Hennessey Digital.

Forbes ranked 43 Texans among the 400 wealthiest Americans last year, with Elon Musk topping the list. Houston hospitality king, Rockets owner, and newly appointed ambassador to Italy Tilman Fertitta was the 12th richest Texan and the 99th richest person in the United States, according to Forbes.

Which state comes out on top for the largest share of millionaire taxpayers? Connecticut, with 44.76 millionaire tax filers for every 10,000 filers, the Hennessey study shows. A number of well-to-do Connecticut suburbs are situated just a commuter train ride away from New York City, where bankers, brokers, and others pull in the big bucks. (Connecticut sits two spots above New York state in the millionaire ranking.)

The numbers in the study “highlight the diverse economic landscapes across our nation. States with favorable tax policies and thriving industries tend to attract more high-income earners,” says Jason Hennessey, CEO of Hennessey Digital. “Understanding these patterns can provide valuable insights for businesses and individuals making decisions about where to live, work, or invest.”

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This story originally appeared on our sister site, CultureMap.com.

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It's never too early to start thinking about the holiday shopping season. Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash

Texas ranks No. 5 worst state for package delays in U.S., report says

out for delivery

One of the biggest headaches of online shopping and package shipping is the potential for delivery issues, and Texas is among the worst places for them, according to a new study.

Online retailer Overnight Glasses determined that Texas is the No. 5 worst state for package delays, based on a nationwide analysis of internet searches regarding delayed or lost packages, statewide United States Postal Service (USPS) performances, and freight flows per capita.

The data showed Texas had the highest freight flow compared to the rest of the U.S., raking in $3.64 billion. But the state’s massive population is a major factor contributing to “logistical challenges,” as shown in Texas’ local USPS performance rates.

“The USPS performance rate in Texas at an average 65 percent, and issues with timely deliveries, as reflected in the search value of 85.0 gives the state a high position in the ranking,” the report said.

Given the vast number of packages being sent through Texas’ delivery infrastructure, it’s safe to say Santa's going to be working overtime to fulfill the online orders for Houston's biggest spenders over the holidays.

The absolute worst place in the U.S. for package delays was North Dakota, which ranked as the No. 1 worst state for package delays.

The study found residents frequently search delivery issue terms such as “package delayed” or “order not delivered,” which doesn’t bode well for a state with a population of just 783,000.

“In today’s world, where everyone expects quick deliveries, even small hiccups can lead to a lot of frustration,” an Overnight Glasses spokesperson said. “I think this study highlights a real need for companies to invest in better, more flexible logistics networks, especially in states where freight flow is high.”

The best state for getting your packages delivered in a timely manner was Hawaii, followed by Oklahoma, West Virginia, Maryland, and Mississippi.

The top 10 worst U.S. states for package delivery issues are:

  • No. 1 – North Dakota
  • No. 2 – Georgia
  • No. 3 – Illinois
  • No. 4 – New York
  • No. 5 – Texas
  • No. 6 – Wyoming
  • No. 7 – Washington
  • No. 8 – Virginia
  • No. 9 – Massachusetts
  • No. 10 – South Carolina

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

Here's how Texas towns stacked up on a new population report. Photo via Getty Images

Booming Houston suburb, other Texas towns among the fastest-growing U.S. cities in 2023

by the numbers

One Houston suburb experienced one of the most rapid growth spurts in the country last year: Fulshear, whose population grew by 25.6 percent, more than 51 times that of the nation’s growth rate of 0.5 percent. The city's population was 42,616 as of July 1, 2023.

According to U.S. Census Bureau's Vintage 2023 Population Estimates, released Thursday, May 16, Fulshear — which lies west of Katy in northwest Fort Bend County - ranked No. 2 on the list of fastest-growing cities with a population of 20,000 or more. It's no wonder iconic Houston restaurants like Molina's Cantina see opportunities there.

The South still dominates the nation's growth, even as America’s Northeast and Midwest cities are rebounding slightly from years of population drops. The census estimates showed 13 of the 15 fastest-growing cities in the U.S. were in the South — eight in Texas alone.

The Texas cities joining Fulshear on the fastest-growing-cities list are:

  • Celina (No. 1) with 26.6 percent growth (42,616 total population)
  • Princeton (No. 3) with 22.3 percent growth (28,027 total population)
  • Anna (No. 4) with 16.9 percent growth (27,501 total population)
  • Georgetown (No. 8) with 10.6 percent growth (96,312 total population)
  • Prosper (No. 9) with 10.5 percent growth (41,660 total population)
  • Forney (No. 10) with 10.4 percent growth (35,470 total population)
  • Kyle (No. 11) with 9 percent growth (62,548 total population)

Texas trends
San Antonio saw the biggest growth spurt in the United States last year, numbers-wise. The Alamo City added about 22,000 residents. San Antonio now has nearly 1.5 million people, making it the the seventh largest city in the U.S. and second largest in Texas.

Its population boom was followed by those of other Southern cities, including Fort Worth; Charlotte, North Carolina; Jacksonville, Florida; and Port St. Lucie, Florida.

Fast-growing Fort Worth (978,000) surpassed San Jose, California (970,000) to become the 12th most populous city in the country.

Meanwhile, population slowed in the Austin area. Jacksonville, Florida (986,000), outpaced Austin (980,000), pushing the Texas capital to 11th largest city in the U.S. (barely ahead of Fort Worth).

Population growth in Georgetown, outside Austin, slowed by more than one-fourth its population growth in 2022, the report says, from 14.4 percent to 10.6 percent. It's the same story in the Central Texas city of Kyle, whose population growth decreased by nearly 2 percent to 9 percent in 2023.

Most populated cities
New York City with nearly 8.3 million people remained the nation's largest city in population as of July 1, 2023. Los Angeles was second at close to 4 million residents, while Chicago was third at 2.7 million and Houston was fourth at 2.3 million residents.

The 15 populous U.S. cities in 2023 were:

  1. New York, New York (8.3 million)
  2. Los Angeles, California (4 million)
  3. Chicago, Illinois (2.7 million)
  4. Houston, Texas (2.3 million)
  5. Phoenix, Arizona (1.7 million)
  6. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1.6 million)
  7. San Antonio (1.5 million)
  8. San Diego, California (1.4 million)
  9. Dallas (1.3 million)
  10. Jacksonville, Florida (986,000)
  11. Austin (980,000)
  12. Fort Worth (978,000)
  13. San Jose (970,000)
  14. Columbus, Ohio (913,000)
  15. Charlotte, North Carolina (911,000)

Modest reversals of population declines were seen last year in large cities in the nation's Northeast and Midwest. Detroit, for example, which grew for the first time in decades, had seen an exodus of people since the 1950s. Yet the estimates released Thursday show the population of Michigan’s largest city rose by just 1,852 people from 631,366 in 2022 to 633,218 last year.

It's a milestone for Detroit, which had 1.8 million residents in the 1950s only to see its population dwindle and then plummet through suburban white flight, a 1967 race riot, the migration to the suburbs by many of the Black middle class and the national economic downturn that foreshadowed the city's 2013 bankruptcy filing.

Three of the largest cities in the U.S. that had been bleeding residents this decade staunched those departures somewhat. New York City, which has lost almost 550,000 residents this decade so far, saw a drop of only 77,000 residents last year, about three-fifths the numbers from the previous year.

Los Angeles lost only 1,800 people last year, following a decline in the 2020s of almost 78,000 residents. Chicago, which has lost almost 82,000 people this decade, only had a population drop of 8,200 residents last year.

And San Francisco, which has lost a greater share of residents this decade than any other big city — almost 7.5 percent — actually grew by more than 1,200 residents last year.

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

Houstonians live well. Photo via Getty Images

Houston scores respectable rank in new report of best U.S. cities for working-class families

is the living easy?

A new economic analysis by the Ludwig Institute for Shared Economic Prosperity (LISEP) has revealed that Houston-The-Woodlands-Sugar Land has the 30th most prosperous local economy in the nation. The analysis ranked the 50 largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) in the U.S. based on several localized economic factors.

According to Houston's data, the region's population has skyrocketed 18.7 percent within the last decade, now reaching over 7.34 million people. The median age of an Houston-area resident is 35.1-years-old.

The three main criteria that determined Houston's prospering rank include a "True Living Cost" metric that tracks price changes for essential household necessities; a "True Weekly Earnings" calculation that determines the median weekly earnings of all workers (including part-timers and those who are unemployed); and a "True Rate of Unemployment Out of the Population" metric that measures the percentage of people unable to find full-time employment with a living wage.

The findings show that a little more than half of all Houston-area households are earning enough income to afford their basic needs. The remaining 46.4 percent are struggling due to a high cost of living, the report said.

"The total costs of necessities for a 4-person family [in Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land] increased 58.2 percent since 2005 from $54,052 to $85,492," the report said.

Furthermore, Houstonians are bringing home higher weekly earnings than they were in 2020. Houston workers are earning a median $894.89 per week, or about $47,429.17 a year. The report states the average employee has gained 8.2 percent more purchasing power since 2005, and the average Houston household has 8.1 percent of their income leftover after their necessities.

Houston's "True Rate of Unemployment Out of the Population" is 63 percent, according to the analysis.

The objective behind LISEP's report is to help policymakers assess their local economies' dynamics and to assess how much low-income and working-class families are affected, according to LISEP Chairman Gene Ludwig in the release.

"Across the nation we are seeing both ends of the spectrum — communities where middle- and working-class families are faring well and others where financial survival remains a struggle," Ludwig said. "Our challenge here is in identifying what's working well and replicating it; what's not, and scrapping it. This is where real-world data can be invaluable to policymakers."

Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land wasn't the only Texas metro area to earn a spot in the analysis. Austin-Round Rock worked its way up into No. 2 nationally, while San Antonio-New Braunfels ranked just outside the top 10 at No. 13. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington ranked four spots higher than Houston at No. 26.

The top 10 highest-performing economies in the U.S. are:

  • No. 1 – San Jose-Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, California
  • No. 2 – Austin-Round Rock, Texas
  • No. 3 – San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward, California
  • No. 4 – Baltimroe-Columbia-Towson, Maryland
  • No. 5 – Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, District of Columbia-Virginia-Maryland
  • No. 6 – Minneapolis-St. Paul-Blookington, Minnesota-Wisconsin
  • No. 7 – Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, Oregon-Washington
  • No. 8 – Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, Wisconsin
  • No. 9 – Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, Colorado
  • No. 10 – Salt Lake City, Utah
The full report and its methodology can be found on lisep.org.

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

The Texas/California pipeline works both ways, a new study reveals. Photo via Getty Images

Texas and California battle it out for most relocating residents, Census report says

by the numbers

Texans love to joke about how many Californians are moving here, but a rising trend in Texas residents' relocation habits may have Californians saying the same thing about Texans soon.

A new U.S. Census report analyzing state-to-state migration has revealed new estimates regarding Texas' growing population in 2022. According to the report, more than 668,000 new residents relocated to Texas from out-of-state last year.

Not surprisingly, the highest number of new Texans hailed from California. More than 102,000 Californians made the move to the Lone Star State in 2022.

But in a fun population twist, California also received the most Texpats in 2022, the report showed, followed closely behind by Florida, then Oklahoma. Of the 494,077 people who left Texas last year, 42,279 went to California.

Why Californians move to Texas
Californians often seek out a lower cost of living by moving to the most "affordable" cities in the state. Houston has shown to be at the top of the priority destination list; Dallas usurped Austin as the No. 1 city for California movers earlier this year. And when a California transplant can save more than $646,000 by moving to Texas and buying a home in Houston, it's not hard to see the appeal

Other reasons for the California-to-Texas exodus include the lack of income tax and the flexibility of remote work opportunities, they say.

While California took the lead with the most new movers flocking to Texas, Floridians are also choosing to pack up and leave their Sunshine State for the Lone Star State, the report says.

The top 5 states with the most residents moving to Texas in 2022 were:

  • California – 102,442 new residents
  • Florida – 41,747 new residents
  • New York – 30,890 new residents
  • Illinois – 25,272 new residents
  • Louisiana – 25,192 new residents

Where Texans are moving
The Census report showed that less than half a million Texas residents relocated out-of-state last year, totaling 494,077 people.

"Texas had the country's lowest (11.7 percent) outmigration rate, with most of those who did move relocating to California (42,479) or Florida (38,207)," the report said.

The top five states where Texans moved in 2022 were:

  • California – 42,279 Texans
  • Florida – 38,207 Texans
  • Oklahoma – 26,440 Texans
  • Colorado – 25,466 Texans
  • Georgia – 23,754 Texans

New Texans from abroad
In addition to state-by-state migration data, the report also provided estimates for how many new Texans came from abroad. Out of 237,051 new residents, the majority – 233,751 people – relocated from outside the mainland last year.

About 2,441 people moved from Puerto Rico, and 859 arrived from unspecified U.S. island areas.

Texas has been a magnet for international homebuyers for several years. The state has held its position as the third hottest U.S. housing market for international homebuyers for the fourth consecutive year in 2023. A total of 9,900 Texas homes were purchased by buyers from outside the U.S last year, spending a gigantic sum of $4.3 billion.

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

Chicago and New York residents are eyeing Houston. Getty Images

Report finds two major metros are the biggest sources of new Houstonians

new to hou

Despite the current state of things — a pandemic, historic unemployment numbers, and an unstable economy — people are still thinking of moving. And, according to Apartment List, they have eyes on Texas.

The website's quarterly Renter Migration Report is out, using searches made on its platform between January 1 and April 15, 2020, to map where renters are looking to make their next move.

Chicago (3.3 percent), New York (3.4 percent), and San Antonio (22.8 percent) are also eyeing Houston, while H-Town residents are looking to keep it close in Dallas (8.9 percent), San Antonio (6.8 percent), and Austin (6.6 percent).

Austin is the most popular Texas city in the report, with the region increasingly being seen as an alternative to the expensive coastal metros where tech jobs have historically clustered. A staggering 70.9 percent of searches for apartments in Austin come from outside the metro, Apartment List reports, the highest share among the nation's 50 largest metros.

Aside from the 25 percent searching from San Antonio, the 4.6 percent from Dallas, and the 4.5 percent from Houston, 4.2 percent of renters searching for apartments in Austin currently live in the New York City metro. Furthermore, 2.5 percent of inbound searches to Austin are coming from Los Angeles and an additional 2.5 percent are coming from the San Francisco Bay Area.

For as many people who want to enter Austin from San Antonio, there's nearly the same amount that would be doing the opposite. Austin renters searched for San Antonio (16.8 percent), Dallas (7.9 percent), and College Station (6.4 percent).

While current Chicago residents and New Yorkers are typing "Dallas" into their search bars, accounting for 3.6 percent and 3 percent of data exploring Big D, respectively, it's San Antonians who are truly interested. A whopping 23.1 percent of current Alamo City residents made exploratory apartment searches in Dallas this past quarter. Overall, 32.8 percent of those looking for a place to live in Dallas are searching from outside the metro.

Meanwhile, 8.7 percent of apartment hunters currently living in Dallas are looking to move elsewhere. They searched for Houston (4.9 percent), San Antonio (4.8 percent), and Los Angeles (4.5 percent).

And though we've heard about it several times, where does San Antonio fall in all this? Turns out renters who currently live there are thinking about moving to Dallas (17.7 percent), followed by Houston (12.4 percent) and Austin (8.4 percent). Residents of McAllen (5 percent), Dallas (3.9 percent), and Houston (3.5 percent) are considering making San Antonio home.

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

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Houston startup raises $6M to scale home-based healthcare platform

fresh funding

As healthcare systems race to expand care beyond hospitals and into the home, investors are placing bigger bets on the infrastructure needed to make that shift possible.

This month, Rosarium Health announced it has raised $6 million in seed funding led by Kalos Ventures, with participation from ResilienceVC, Rock Health Capital, Symphonic Capital, Black Tech Nations Ventures and others.

The investment will help the Houston-based startup continue to build its platform, which features a national network of 800-plus clinicians and 3,000-plus contractors to coordinate home accessibility upgrades and modifications for seniors and people living with disabilities.

For founder and CEO Cameron Carter, the company’s mission grew out of firsthand caregiving experiences.

“From my own personal caregiving experiences, I realized that the benefits exist on paper, but not in reality,” Carter said in a news release. “Families are being left to figure out the paperwork and installations all on their own, which shouldn’t be how this works.”

While Medicare Advantage and Medicaid plans have expanded coverage for home-based services and accessibility modifications, the logistics behind delivering those services often remain fragmented.

Rosarium’s platform coordinates the entire process, from clinical assessments and referrals to contractor management, documentation, reimbursement and installation.

“A clinician can document that a home isn’t safe and a plan can approve a benefit, but there’s no one that’s responsible for making sure the work actually gets done,” Carter says. “We built the missing piece.”

The company was founded in 2021 as Rose Health and was a 2023 participant in the Texas Medical Center’s Accelerator for HealthTech program. It has scaled quickly, building a network of more than 800 clinicians and 3,000 contractors across 34 states.

Rosarium is currently in-network for 1.2 million Medicare and Medicaid lives, with projected coverage expected to reach nearly 4 million by the end of the year, according to the release.

“We’re excited to back Cameron because he and the team at Rosarium are building the infrastructure healthcare needs right now to make the home a safe and comfortable place of care,” Kate Ballinger, investor at Kalos Ventures, added in the release.

As part of the recent investment, Ballinger will join Rosarium’s board of directors.

With eyes on the future, Rosarium plans to grow its partnerships with Medicaid and Medicare Advantage plans, including CalViva and Community Health Plan of Imperial Valley, strengthening its presence in California while expanding access to underserved communities.

Additionally, Carter predicts that home-based healthcare will be part of a broader transformation happening across the industry.

“There’s a growing recognition that health outcomes are shaped by what happens in the home,” he said in the release. “The future of healthcare isn’t just treating people after something goes wrong. It’s creating environments that help prevent those problems in the first place.”

4 Houston-area institutions get $8M for cancer research facilities

fighting cancer

Cancer research capabilities in the Houston area just got an $8 million boost.

On Wednesday, May 20, the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) awarded $8 million in grants to institutions in Houston and Bryan for the creation or expansion of so-called “core” cancer research facilities.

“Core facilities provide shared access to advanced technology, equipment, and scientific expertise that may not be available at every institution,” CPRIT says. “These core facilities are vital to not only cancer research but also to the study of diseases beyond cancer.”

Houston-area recipients of these $2 million grants are:

  • A facility at the University of Texas Health Science Center for preclinical support of cancer researchers in Texas to evaluate new safe, effective drugs and drug combinations.
  • The Accelerator for Cancer Therapeutics, operated by Houston’s Texas Medical Center Foundation. The accelerator helps researchers and startups move innovative cancer treatments from the lab to clinical trials.
  • Rice University’s Genetic Design & Engineering Center in Houston. The center enables researchers to collaborate on studies of custom DNA for cancer treatment.
  • A facility at the Texas A&M University System’s Health Science Center in Bryan that aims to speed up the development of cancer therapies.

In addition to those grants, the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Methodist Hospital Research Institute, Baylor College of Medicine, and Rice University shared $21 million to recruit cancer researchers from other institutions.

The largest of those grants—totalling $4 million—went to M.D. Anderson for the recruitment of renowned cancer researcher Andre Nussenzweig from the National Institutes of Health. His research focuses on how DNA damage and faulty DNA repairs lead to cancer.

Here are the totals for the other CPRIT grants awarded in the Houston area:

  • $12.8 million to Houston-based Indapta Therapeutics for the development of an off-the-shelf therapy that naturally kills cancer cells, combined with an immunity-targeting agent for a type of leukemia.
  • $11.1 million to MD Anderson, including $5 million for a statewide platform to improve long-term health outcomes in adolescents and young adults who survived cancer.
  • $8.4 million to Baylor College of Medicine, including $4.8 million for two training programs for cancer researchers.
  • $6.25 million to UT Health Houston, including $4 million for a biomedical informatics and genomics training program for cancer researchers.
  • $4.4 million to the Texas A&M Health Science Center’s Houston campus, including $2.4 million for a cancer therapeutics training program.
  • $2.75 million to Rice, including $250,000 for a study of ovarian cancer.
  • $2 million to Houston-based March Biosciences for the development of a targeted therapy for treating T-cell lymphoma.
  • $1.15 million to the University of Houston, including $900,000 for a platform for detection of lung cancer.
  • $900,000 to Texas A&M in Bryan to conduct clinical drug trials in rural and underserved communities around the state.
  • $800,000 to Houston- and Israel-based Xerient Pharma for the development of an oral form of a cell-protecting drug called amifostine to protect the upper GI tract from radiation damage during pancreatic cancer treatment.
  • $659,000 to Missouri City-based OmniNano Pharmaceuticals for the development of a two-drug combination to treat the most common form of pancreatic cancer.
  • $250,000 to the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston for a novel therapeutic to prevent colitis-related colorectal cancer.

Axiom Space launches Japanese subsidiary, names leadership

Axiom Space is setting up a Japanese subsidiary to tap into billions of dollars worth of business opportunities in the vast Asia-Pacific region. The company’s new office in Japan will open July 1.

“For the Asia-Pacific region, an Axiom Space presence in Japan means a long-term, direct path to low-Earth orbit for research, for industry, for astronauts, and a partner committed to building that future together with Japan,” Jonathan Cirtain, president and CEO of Axiom Space, said in a news release.

Asia-Pacific spaceflight leaders include Japan, China, India and South Korea.

Until committing to the Asia-Pacific subsidiary, Axiom focused primarily on the U.S. market for space exploration equipment, technology and services. Axiom is building the successor to the International Space Station (ISS), and it provides human spaceflight services and develops next-generation spacesuits.

Fortune Business Insights estimates the Asia-Pacific market for space technology was valued at $155.3 billion in 2025.

“The region is rapidly expanding due to rapidly expanding government space programs, increasing private sector participation, and rising demand for satellite services across densely populated regions,” says Fortune Business Insights, a market research firm.

The region’s combination of strategic investments, market demand and emerging entrepreneurial systems positions Asia-Pacific “for the fastest growth in the global market,” Fortune Business Insights says.

The market research firm pegs the U.S. market for space technology at $251.8 billion in 2025, making it the world’s largest player in that sector.

Veteran Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata will lead Axiom Space Japan as chief technology officer in the Asia-Pacific region. The Japanese subsidiary will work with government agencies, research institutions, and industrial partners in Japan to expand hardware development and manufacturing, microgravity research and orbital computing.

Wakata was the Japanese space agency’s first program manager for ISS and the station’s first Japanese commander. He also contributed to the construction of ISS, including the Japanese experiment module Kibo. Wakata retired from the Japanese agency, JAXA, in March 2024.

“Japan intends to remain a leading nation in human space exploration post-ISS, and Japanese industry and academia are ready to play a central role in the commercial era,” Axiom Space said in the release. “Axiom Space Japan is how the company will meet that ambition with a long-term, on-the-ground presence.”

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