Guess What? New York Is Not Actually the Most Unhappy State in America
This might be hard to wrap your head around, so maybe pop a squat and brace yourself. New York is not the most unhappy state in the United States. I repeat New York is not the most unhappy state.
I know what you're thinking. How can this be when my friend and family who live in New York do nothing but complain. Complain about the weather, politics, where to go or not go for dinner, and even complain that someone passes them and smiled. The audacity!
Sure, we've got some problems in New York, some huge problems. Taxes are, I think, something everyone can agree on being a serious mood killer. Lack of support for small businesses is another. And up until he resigned, both sides could agree that Andrew Cuomo was not the governor we needed him to be.
But you know what else we have in New York? We have resilience. We have communities that come together when catastrophe hits. We are able to experience all four seasons and we have an incredible landscape. We have great options for education and we have some of the best medical facilities in the country.
WalletHub decided to gauge the overall happiness of residents in each of the 50 states to determine which states were the happiest and which states were the least happy.
The crown for the happiest state in America goes to Utah where they have a total happy score of 72.94. The unfortunate title of least happy state goes to West Virginia where their happy score is a miserable 34.05. So, where does New York fall? In the upper half of the happiness half, actually. New York ranked at number 18 with a happy score of 57.19. Even more unhappy than New York? Our neighbors in Pennsylvania only have a happiness score of 53.18 and come in at number 24.
Want even more great news about New York? The study found that New York has the 5th lowest level of adult depression and the 2nd lowest level of suicide.