By Eve Tahmincioglu

In the last year, more people relocating for jobs became Texans and Virginians than New Yorkers and Kansans.

At least those were the findings of a relocation study recently released by Atlas Van Lines, one of the nation’s largest moving companies. Overall, the number of moves nationally, which were mainly due to new job placement, increased by 7 percent last year to 80,289, up from 74,541 a year ago.

“Our annual migration patterns study is an interesting gauge of the economy, where economic development is taking place and trends to follow throughout the upcoming year,” said Jack Griffin, president and COO of Atlas World Group, which reviews moving patterns annually. “These new findings are especially promising, as we saw the number of moves increase yet again across North America.”

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Washington, D.C., had the highest percentage of inbound moves for the sixth year in a row, while Ohio continued to have the highest percentage of outbound migrators.

• Slideshow: Dreaming of D.C.

But the surprise was Michigan, which for the first time in six years went from a state where people headed out of more than they headed in, to a state with a split between inbound and outbound relocaters.

Here’s a run down by region from the Atlas report: (Definition for “inbound” is more than 55 percent of total shipments moving into the states; “outbound” is more than 55 percent moving out of the state; and “balanced” is inbound and outbound each representing 55 percent or less of the total.)

Northern states
With the exception of New Hampshire, which went from an inbound to a balanced state, and Massachusetts, Connecticut and West Virginia, which transformed from balanced to outbound states, the Northern States saw relatively few changes in moving patterns from 2010 to 2011.

Southern states
The Southeast remains balanced with the exception of Louisiana, which switched from a balanced state to an outbound one in 2011. Southwest states Texas and New Mexico continue to be inbound states, as well as Mid-Atlantic states Virginia and North Carolina. After becoming a newly inbound state in 2010, Kentucky is now balanced.

Midwestern states
Again seeing the majority of its states with more outbound than inbound moves, the Midwest region only has three balanced states — Iowa, South Dakota and Michigan. Despite uncertain economic conditions, Michigan became a balanced state following a six-year streak as an outbound state. Wisconsin, Nebraska and Kansas finished 2011 as outbound states — all of which were previously classified as balanced states for seven, nine and 10 years in a row, respectively.

Western states
The annual study shows that the majority of the Western states remain balanced with only two states changing status.  Utah is now an outbound state and Wyoming is now balanced.

Read the full report here.