Hey look everyone! It's more states and how I rank them according to a delicate mix of meaningful quality of life factors, in addition to other random and arbitrary factors.
20. Alaska
I haven't been, but from what I've seen Alaska looks absolutely beautiful and I've love to go (although, as with Montana - people who go will need to watch out for bears). Women's equality in Alaska? #2 in the nation! Personal sense of well-being? #2 again! High school graduation? Not that far behind at #3! Poverty? One of the lowest rates in the nation with it being the eight least poor state. Integration among races? Surprisingly prevalent! This sounds like a great place - so what's the catch? Other than Sarah Palin and the fact that Alaskans are some of the highest drug abusers in the nation - Alaska is dead worst in the nation for both violent crime and healthcare. Which means if you're shot in Alaska during a fight with one of the Palin kids over meth (which, again, is a near statistical certainly if you're there) then you might as well not even go to the hospital because you'll just die there anyway.
19. Delaware
Delaware is not at all that interesting to me, and this is one of those ones where I just let it lay wherever it wound up based on the mathematical analysis. Delaware has no intangibles - positive or negative. Why dedicate any more effort to talking about this tiny, meaningless state? It's not even famous for being boring like North Dakota or Wyoming. It's simply just not famous at all. Delaware people... nobody cares that you were the "first" state. It doesn't impress anyone. You managed to ratify the Constitution a whole five days sooner than Pennsylvania because your convention had a smaller number of members and the compromise text totally benefited you by giving your tiny worthless state the same number of senators as more populated states. Big fucking deal. You only come in this high because you have below average poverty, above average education, tax-free shopping, and really nothing else intensively negative to say about you. But if we just made you a county in Maryland and turned DC or Puerto Rico the 50th state to keep the stars on the flag consistent, nobody would notice or care that Delaware went missing.
18. Oregon
Oregon (or Washington-Lite, as its known) is a cool little state and Portland (or Seattle-Lite, as its known) seems like a cool little place that I'd want to visit sometime. And since we've already cracked a few places into the top 20 we can go ahead and call this state, and all other states after it, "good" states. Will these states have problems still? Sure. Oregon has high unemployment and poverty, as well as below average well-being rankings and healthcare. But it's also got low crime, ample opportunities for women, and solidly great education at all levels (high school, college, and advanced). Oregon has no sales tax, delicious food, and beautiful scenery. And if you're the type of person who likes smelling awful and being judged - don't forget about all the weed here! The one word of caution - you're going to need a pretty high tolerance for hipsters.What's up with acquitting those dildo-laden militia idiots though? I'll leave you here at 18, Oregon. But if you pull some shit like that again you're going to wind up somewhere around Arkansas.
17. Rhode Island
Rhode Island is the smallest state and there really isn't anything else too interesting to say about it. Honestly, it's probably most famous for being the setting of Family Guy these days. If you're thinking of renting a cabin in New England and going to look at pretty leaves in the fall... you're probably going to go to Vermont, New Hampshire or Maine instead. CNBC ranked Rhode Island as the worst state for businesses and infrastructure - but who cares about CNBC? Rhode Island comes in pretty high for higher education, and is one of the top 10 lowest crime states in the union. And honestly, Rhode Island could have been ranked a little higher if Tom Hiddleston had just drowned Taylor Swift there (not that I'd encourage murder, that's terrible! *shifty eyes*). Pawtucket, Rhode Island is the headquarters of Hasbro, so you can thank them for Transformers, GI Joe, and My Little Pony too (if you're into that kind of thing, MIKE). And after M.A.S.K. too after they acquired the rights from Kenner. Do you remember M.A.S.K.? Probably not, nobody does. Let's move on.
16. Wisconsin
Green Bay boasts that it is the "Toilet Paper Capital of the World," which is a fairly lame thing to be proud about. They may want to strike some sort of TP-for-Oil deal with Venezuela, if you ask me. Do you like dairy? Sure you do! I mean, I guess unless you're lactose intolerant. Do you like beer? Milwaukee named their team the "Brewers," so they have that too! Wisconsin is above average in life expectancy (definitive proof that cheese and beer is good for you), women's equality, personal well-being, high school graduation (even Fonzie eventually graduated and he was a slacker), and is below average in the bad things like crime rates and poverty. What does Wisconsin suck at? Racial integration. They come in 48 in the nation. Every single state with a Confederate flag has more opportunities for minorities and less segregation than Wisconsin, which is saying a lot. Even wealthy and well-off minorities are essentially forced to live in poorer communities because segregation is so prevalent.
15. New York
As I briefly touched on when discussing Arizona, people in New York think New York is the best and New York is the center of the entire damn world. And this typically means specifically "New York City." Most New York City residents don't even think or remember that the vast majority of their state isn't the city. The Cato Institute (a libertarian think tank - so take that for what it's worth depending on your politics) called New York the least "free" state in the nation. People there also have poor assessments of their well-being, crime is high, high school education is low, healthcare is poor, and poverty is prevalent. On the flip side, New York is one of the best states for higher education, women's equality, life expectancy, and the overall physical health of its people (including factors such as low obesity). Sure, New York City is a great city... to visit. I don't think I could ever live there. I don't understand people who could actually permanently live in a place like that. Oh, and as for the racial integration and opportunity thing... I think I'll defer to John Oliver to talk about that one.
14. Iowa
Prepare to be offended, New Yorkers! Yes, I'm saying that these corn-eating motherfuckers in Iowa are better than you. Iowa, isn't this fly over country? Yes, it is. But if for some reason you have to stop in the middle of the country it might as well be Iowa. Why? Good primary education, good healthcare, low unemployment, high self-worth, high life expectancy, low crime, low poverty, and lots of opportunities for women. So really, the only thing that drives Iowa down is the "boringness" factor. But is it really as boring as a North Dakota? Of course not, or I would have ranked it down there. Maybe you should check out the Great River Road National Scenic Byway or the field from Field of Dreams. Yeah, that's right - the awesomeness of Field of Dreams is being included in these ranking weights (sorry angry North Carolinians who think you should have been ranked high, Bull Durham is shit and didn't help you any). Of course with Iowa I was going to go back to mentioning corn again. Let's not knock corn. Corn is delicious. Just imagine Mexican food without maize. It's also used in chemicals, bio-feul, fodder for animal feed, and is the primary ingredient in the second most American thing after Jazz music - bourbon. Not a fan of HFCS? Yeah, well I guess that's why Iowa has some pretty high obesity rates. Still, if you're not the type of person who wants to live on the highly populated coasts and you just want to settle down and live on a farm somewhere - you might as well choose Iowa.
13. California
Another thing which will thoroughly annoy New Yorkers is that I have just ranked their arch nemeis, California, above them. I'm not going to say anything nice about Los Angeles, because Los Angeles is one of the most terrible places in the world and New York City is clearly better. But state-wide, California has a lot more to offer. Nicer weather, all those beaches, great wine, and Mexican food (yeah, I mentioned Mexican food twice in a row. But just because they make corn in Iowa doesn't mean you'll want to eat Mexican food there. The best place in the US for Mexican is Cali). California ranks in the top 5 states in the nation for women's equality, racial integration, the health of its people, and life expectancy. What sucks about California? It's near the bottom for high school education ranks (it's almost as bad as Mississippi and Texas), and there is high unemployment and poverty. And let me tell something to all you Californians out there that you don't want to hear: In-N-Out Burger is one of the most overrated things in the history of time. I'm sorry, but it's just barely better than McDonalds. After hearing all this talk about In-N-Out form every damn Californian I've ever met, I was so hyped the first time I went to one. Five Guys and Shake Shack are infinitely better.
12. Virginia
I'm not personally a huge fan of capitol of the Confederate States of America, but the statistics tell me that by biases might be wrong. Or at least there is enough good stuff in Northern Virginia to make up for the fact that the rest of the state has places named "Lynchberg" (named after someone named "Lynch?" Suuuuuuuure, Virginians. Tell yourself whatever you want to sleep at night). Virginia has low crime, great higher education, low unemployment (thanks military industrial complex propped up around the Pentagon!), high racial integration, good healthcare, a generally positive well-being index, and a lot of other good stuff. In throwing the statics together - Virginia came in above average in the nation for all the good things and below average for all the bad things with one exception: women's equality and opportunities are pretty low (#41). And while that's terrible, shouldn't we all (regardless of sex) be willing to give up just a little bit of our freedom and equality in exchange for great Vietnamese food at the Eden Center? If you're Virginian and don't know what I'm talking about, then you're from the part of Virginia that is an Alabama exclave. If you don't know what the word "exclave" means, then you were probably also educated in that part of Virginia.
11. Maine
Maine is a bigger state than you might imagine - being larger than the rest of New England combined. Because of that, it has 542,629 acres of beautiful parkland that you can visit for the three months of the year that it's not unbearably cold and miserable. But for those three months you have amazing coastline, rivers, lakes, lighthouses and other things you can do. If has the second lowest violent crime rate in the nation, is the third best state for women's equality, and is great at education and healthcare. Quality of lobsters isn't actually a weight I used for my statistics, but rest assured if it was - Maine would benefited from it. Like Wisconsin though, Maine has a bit of a racial integration problem for the five Black people that live there. Wait, what's that? Steve left last month? Okay... correction... for the four Black people that live there.
Next ranking... I finish off the states! Who will be #1? The anticipation is killing you, isn't it? What thrilling cliffhanger to keep you in suspense! Just kidding, it will be Hawaii (obviously).
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| R.I.P Mr. Salmon |
I haven't been, but from what I've seen Alaska looks absolutely beautiful and I've love to go (although, as with Montana - people who go will need to watch out for bears). Women's equality in Alaska? #2 in the nation! Personal sense of well-being? #2 again! High school graduation? Not that far behind at #3! Poverty? One of the lowest rates in the nation with it being the eight least poor state. Integration among races? Surprisingly prevalent! This sounds like a great place - so what's the catch? Other than Sarah Palin and the fact that Alaskans are some of the highest drug abusers in the nation - Alaska is dead worst in the nation for both violent crime and healthcare. Which means if you're shot in Alaska during a fight with one of the Palin kids over meth (which, again, is a near statistical certainly if you're there) then you might as well not even go to the hospital because you'll just die there anyway.
19. Delaware
Delaware is not at all that interesting to me, and this is one of those ones where I just let it lay wherever it wound up based on the mathematical analysis. Delaware has no intangibles - positive or negative. Why dedicate any more effort to talking about this tiny, meaningless state? It's not even famous for being boring like North Dakota or Wyoming. It's simply just not famous at all. Delaware people... nobody cares that you were the "first" state. It doesn't impress anyone. You managed to ratify the Constitution a whole five days sooner than Pennsylvania because your convention had a smaller number of members and the compromise text totally benefited you by giving your tiny worthless state the same number of senators as more populated states. Big fucking deal. You only come in this high because you have below average poverty, above average education, tax-free shopping, and really nothing else intensively negative to say about you. But if we just made you a county in Maryland and turned DC or Puerto Rico the 50th state to keep the stars on the flag consistent, nobody would notice or care that Delaware went missing.
18. Oregon
Oregon (or Washington-Lite, as its known) is a cool little state and Portland (or Seattle-Lite, as its known) seems like a cool little place that I'd want to visit sometime. And since we've already cracked a few places into the top 20 we can go ahead and call this state, and all other states after it, "good" states. Will these states have problems still? Sure. Oregon has high unemployment and poverty, as well as below average well-being rankings and healthcare. But it's also got low crime, ample opportunities for women, and solidly great education at all levels (high school, college, and advanced). Oregon has no sales tax, delicious food, and beautiful scenery. And if you're the type of person who likes smelling awful and being judged - don't forget about all the weed here! The one word of caution - you're going to need a pretty high tolerance for hipsters.What's up with acquitting those dildo-laden militia idiots though? I'll leave you here at 18, Oregon. But if you pull some shit like that again you're going to wind up somewhere around Arkansas.
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| This state is 45% rich people mansions |
Rhode Island is the smallest state and there really isn't anything else too interesting to say about it. Honestly, it's probably most famous for being the setting of Family Guy these days. If you're thinking of renting a cabin in New England and going to look at pretty leaves in the fall... you're probably going to go to Vermont, New Hampshire or Maine instead. CNBC ranked Rhode Island as the worst state for businesses and infrastructure - but who cares about CNBC? Rhode Island comes in pretty high for higher education, and is one of the top 10 lowest crime states in the union. And honestly, Rhode Island could have been ranked a little higher if Tom Hiddleston had just drowned Taylor Swift there (not that I'd encourage murder, that's terrible! *shifty eyes*). Pawtucket, Rhode Island is the headquarters of Hasbro, so you can thank them for Transformers, GI Joe, and My Little Pony too (if you're into that kind of thing, MIKE). And after M.A.S.K. too after they acquired the rights from Kenner. Do you remember M.A.S.K.? Probably not, nobody does. Let's move on.
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| Although this is inexplicably a hat in this state |
Green Bay boasts that it is the "Toilet Paper Capital of the World," which is a fairly lame thing to be proud about. They may want to strike some sort of TP-for-Oil deal with Venezuela, if you ask me. Do you like dairy? Sure you do! I mean, I guess unless you're lactose intolerant. Do you like beer? Milwaukee named their team the "Brewers," so they have that too! Wisconsin is above average in life expectancy (definitive proof that cheese and beer is good for you), women's equality, personal well-being, high school graduation (even Fonzie eventually graduated and he was a slacker), and is below average in the bad things like crime rates and poverty. What does Wisconsin suck at? Racial integration. They come in 48 in the nation. Every single state with a Confederate flag has more opportunities for minorities and less segregation than Wisconsin, which is saying a lot. Even wealthy and well-off minorities are essentially forced to live in poorer communities because segregation is so prevalent.
15. New York
As I briefly touched on when discussing Arizona, people in New York think New York is the best and New York is the center of the entire damn world. And this typically means specifically "New York City." Most New York City residents don't even think or remember that the vast majority of their state isn't the city. The Cato Institute (a libertarian think tank - so take that for what it's worth depending on your politics) called New York the least "free" state in the nation. People there also have poor assessments of their well-being, crime is high, high school education is low, healthcare is poor, and poverty is prevalent. On the flip side, New York is one of the best states for higher education, women's equality, life expectancy, and the overall physical health of its people (including factors such as low obesity). Sure, New York City is a great city... to visit. I don't think I could ever live there. I don't understand people who could actually permanently live in a place like that. Oh, and as for the racial integration and opportunity thing... I think I'll defer to John Oliver to talk about that one.
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| It's "If you build it, he will come." Get it right, people. |
Prepare to be offended, New Yorkers! Yes, I'm saying that these corn-eating motherfuckers in Iowa are better than you. Iowa, isn't this fly over country? Yes, it is. But if for some reason you have to stop in the middle of the country it might as well be Iowa. Why? Good primary education, good healthcare, low unemployment, high self-worth, high life expectancy, low crime, low poverty, and lots of opportunities for women. So really, the only thing that drives Iowa down is the "boringness" factor. But is it really as boring as a North Dakota? Of course not, or I would have ranked it down there. Maybe you should check out the Great River Road National Scenic Byway or the field from Field of Dreams. Yeah, that's right - the awesomeness of Field of Dreams is being included in these ranking weights (sorry angry North Carolinians who think you should have been ranked high, Bull Durham is shit and didn't help you any). Of course with Iowa I was going to go back to mentioning corn again. Let's not knock corn. Corn is delicious. Just imagine Mexican food without maize. It's also used in chemicals, bio-feul, fodder for animal feed, and is the primary ingredient in the second most American thing after Jazz music - bourbon. Not a fan of HFCS? Yeah, well I guess that's why Iowa has some pretty high obesity rates. Still, if you're not the type of person who wants to live on the highly populated coasts and you just want to settle down and live on a farm somewhere - you might as well choose Iowa.
13. California
Another thing which will thoroughly annoy New Yorkers is that I have just ranked their arch nemeis, California, above them. I'm not going to say anything nice about Los Angeles, because Los Angeles is one of the most terrible places in the world and New York City is clearly better. But state-wide, California has a lot more to offer. Nicer weather, all those beaches, great wine, and Mexican food (yeah, I mentioned Mexican food twice in a row. But just because they make corn in Iowa doesn't mean you'll want to eat Mexican food there. The best place in the US for Mexican is Cali). California ranks in the top 5 states in the nation for women's equality, racial integration, the health of its people, and life expectancy. What sucks about California? It's near the bottom for high school education ranks (it's almost as bad as Mississippi and Texas), and there is high unemployment and poverty. And let me tell something to all you Californians out there that you don't want to hear: In-N-Out Burger is one of the most overrated things in the history of time. I'm sorry, but it's just barely better than McDonalds. After hearing all this talk about In-N-Out form every damn Californian I've ever met, I was so hyped the first time I went to one. Five Guys and Shake Shack are infinitely better.
12. Virginia
I'm not personally a huge fan of capitol of the Confederate States of America, but the statistics tell me that by biases might be wrong. Or at least there is enough good stuff in Northern Virginia to make up for the fact that the rest of the state has places named "Lynchberg" (named after someone named "Lynch?" Suuuuuuuure, Virginians. Tell yourself whatever you want to sleep at night). Virginia has low crime, great higher education, low unemployment (thanks military industrial complex propped up around the Pentagon!), high racial integration, good healthcare, a generally positive well-being index, and a lot of other good stuff. In throwing the statics together - Virginia came in above average in the nation for all the good things and below average for all the bad things with one exception: women's equality and opportunities are pretty low (#41). And while that's terrible, shouldn't we all (regardless of sex) be willing to give up just a little bit of our freedom and equality in exchange for great Vietnamese food at the Eden Center? If you're Virginian and don't know what I'm talking about, then you're from the part of Virginia that is an Alabama exclave. If you don't know what the word "exclave" means, then you were probably also educated in that part of Virginia.
.jpg/1280px-Acadia_National_Park%2C_ME_(16243110897).jpg) |
| It was either this, or a picture of a moose at a lighthouse drinking maple syrup |
Maine is a bigger state than you might imagine - being larger than the rest of New England combined. Because of that, it has 542,629 acres of beautiful parkland that you can visit for the three months of the year that it's not unbearably cold and miserable. But for those three months you have amazing coastline, rivers, lakes, lighthouses and other things you can do. If has the second lowest violent crime rate in the nation, is the third best state for women's equality, and is great at education and healthcare. Quality of lobsters isn't actually a weight I used for my statistics, but rest assured if it was - Maine would benefited from it. Like Wisconsin though, Maine has a bit of a racial integration problem for the five Black people that live there. Wait, what's that? Steve left last month? Okay... correction... for the four Black people that live there.
Next ranking... I finish off the states! Who will be #1? The anticipation is killing you, isn't it? What thrilling cliffhanger to keep you in suspense! Just kidding, it will be Hawaii (obviously).
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