Explore the Findings

Our State of the States report is organized by both state and topic. Select a state to see its full results, or choose a topic to compare how states are doing across a specific measure.

Explore a state’s full results

Compare states by topic

Ranking
1-5
6-10
11-15
16-20
21-25
26-30
31-35
36-40
41-45
46+

Conclusions

The various parts of the country do not operate in isolation. While we stop short of a full analysis that attempts to explain any individual finding or explain the findings’ complex interplay, we do highlight some key patterns and connections.

  • Conclusion #1

    Geography matters — but it's not destiny.

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    Conclusion #1

    Geography matters — but it's not destiny.

    On average, states in the western Midwest and New England outperform other regions across the 31 measures. The three Southern regional divisions rank lowest on average. But regional patterns are not uniform: Southern states perform better than their overall rankings suggest on personal well-being measures like life satisfaction — a reminder that aggregate scores can obscure important nuances at the state level.

  • Conclusion #2

    No state is improving on an alarming number of measures.

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    Conclusion #2

    No state is improving on an alarming number of measures.

    Not a single state is improving on the following 8 measures: life satisfaction, adult depression, youth depression, fatal overdoses, trust in the federal government, income inequality, long-term unemployment, and hourly earnings growth. At the other end of the spectrum, all states are improving on two measures: child mortality and state total income. For the other measures, a large majority of states are trending in the same direction.

  • Conclusion #3

    States are becoming more alike in most ways — but growing further apart on the measures that may be fueling our divisions.

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    Conclusion #3

    States are becoming more alike in most ways — but growing further apart on the measures that may be fueling our divisions.

    Think of it this way: if states were students, most of them would be clustering closer to the class average over time — a sign of shared progress and national cohesion. On 17 measures, states are converging in this way. But on 13 others — particularly income and personal and social well-being — they are diverging. Those are precisely the measures most connected to how people feel about their lives and their neighbors. Growing divergence on lived experience may help explain why Americans feel so divided, even as many national indicators improve.

  • Conclusion #4

    Only a handful of states are improving on any measure of self-reported well-being.

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    Conclusion #4

    Only a handful of states are improving on any measure of self-reported well-being.

    In our prior report, we showed that the nation is ranked low globally on measures of personal well-being (e.g., life satisfaction, anxiety, and depression) and social well-being (e.g., trust in people and institutions). We also showed that the country is worsening over time on most of these measures. Our new analysis reinforces this concern. Of the 225 cases where we can observe state trends in self-reported well-being, only 12 cases show improvement and more than half are worsening – only a 5% success rate.

     

  • Conclusion #5

    A stronger economy does not seem to improve personal well-being — but it may build social trust.

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    Conclusion #5

    A stronger economy does not seem to improve personal well-being — but it may build social trust.

    This is perhaps the most counterintuitive finding. The general decline in self-reported well-being in Conclusion #4 is happening even as incomes continue to rise. Income does appear to support social well-being — particularly trust in other people, trust in government, and trust in science. The implication is both sobering and actionable: economic growth is not enough. Rebuilding well-being will require actions and interventions that go beyond income and GDP.