Newsroom
For all media inquiries, please contact:
Nick Thiriot
Communications Director
nick.thiriot@utah.edu
801-587-3717
News Releases
Federal housing programs provided $482.6 million in financial assistance to Utah in FY2022
April 25, 2025 (Salt Lake City) – States and the federal government share a vital economic relationship. This data summary, the tenth in a series on state and federal economic linkages from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute, presents the Utah-federal government nexus for federal housing assistance. […]
Utah’s Marriage Trends: Young, Married, and Changing
April 22, 2025 (Salt Lake City) – Utah’s distinctive marriage demographics set it apart from the nation. A new report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute shows that Utah has the highest percentage of married adult residents in the nation (54.9%) and comparatively small shares of widowed and divorced residents. In 2023, Utah’s female marriage rate was also the highest in the nation. Adding to these distinctive marriage demographics, Utahns marry younger than residents in every other state. […]
Marriage Penalties in Utah: Taxes, Programs, and Federal Program Ties
April 22, 2025 (Salt Lake City) – Various state and federal tax provisions and programs may create a “marriage penalty” or a “marriage bonus.” A new report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute focuses on selected state-level policies to determine whether they create different levels of marriage penalties, many of which tie directly to federal policies carried into state-administered programs. […]
Utah’s Peer Support Specialists: Understanding Peer Support Training and Workforce Development
April 17, 2025 (Salt Lake City) – Peer support specialists are “individuals who use their lived experience in recovery from mental health and/or substance use disorder…to deliver services promoting recovery and resilience.” The Utah 2025 Peer Support Specialist Workforce Survey, conducted by the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute and Utah Peer Network, suggests ways to effectively engage peer support specialists as part of an integrated care team and help address retention, burnout, and turnover challenges. […]
Recent Media Mentions
Utah population tops 3.5 million, but growth rate down slightly
Utah’s population growth slowed slightly in 2024, but the Beehive State still added 50,392 more residents last year, with much of the growth in Utah and Salt Lake counties. Natural growth, the balancing of births to deaths, and migration were about equally responsible for the population increase. Migration numbers take the number of people moving in and out of the state to determine if migration rose or fell. Net migration was responsible for 52% of the growth, while natural increase accounted for 48% of the new residents.
Utah House votes to bump up misdemeanor penalties, a key threshold for deportations
SALT LAKE CITY – Deporting an immigrant or refugee who’s convicted of certain misdemeanors could get easier in Utah. State lawmakers want to increase the maximum penalty for violent class A misdemeanors and charges of driving under the influence to one year. This would walk back a 2019 law that decreased the maximum penalty to 364 days.
Utah’s Fintech Sector Booms with Billion-Dollar Economic Impact and Vision for Growth
SALT LAKE CITY – Utah's fintech sector is making waves with economic impacts that are hard to ignore. A report by the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute and the Stena Center for Financial Technology highlighted the state's leading position in the fintech movement. Fintech wages in Utah are double the state's average wage and rank third highest among all industries, pumping over $1 billion in wages and more than $7 billion in economic impact into the local economy.
‘Exactly what Olene Walker would want’: Could liquor sales help Utahns buy affordable homes?
SALT LAKE CITY – State Rep. Carol Moss is trying — again — to get millions of dedicated dollars for the Olene Walker Housing Loan Fund. Moss, a Salt Lake City Democrat, is asking her colleagues to divert 25% of liquor sales profit to provide a constant stream of funding for the housing loan fund that, since 1995, has helped build nearly 25,000 units for people with low incomes, according to a report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute.
How Utah’s outdoors has become the secret to Silicon Slopes’ growth
SALT LAKE CITY — Nate Quigley and his wife, Vanessa, studied at BYU, but it was Utah's mountains, rivers, lakes and desert scenery that kept them coming back to the Beehive State after they started careers. A little over a decade ago, they were living in Florida and preparing to launch a company that would ultimately become Chatbooks — an app that essentially helps users turn digital photos into a scrapbook — when they decided to move back to Utah.
Utah GOP leaders defend Trump’s tariffs while bracing for economic ‘turbulence’
SALT LAKE CITY – As developments surrounding President Donald Trump’s tariffs threats unfolded Monday, Utah’s Republican leaders defended Trump’s actions as necessary to crack down on the U.S. fentanyl crisis — while also acknowledging potential trade wars could bring higher costs and negative economic impacts. Trump on Saturday had announced plans to implement tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China. But by Monday afternoon, his threats against Mexico and Canada were delayed by at least 30 days after leaders of the two countries agreed to increase border security efforts.