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Top 10 Happiest U.S. States
Try to name the happiest states in the United States of America, based on how people answered the question "How happy do you feel on a scale from 1 to 4?".
Data from 1.3 million Americans from 2005–2008. Source.
This data is fairly old, but it's very good compared to other data. It's an absolutely massive survey. The one weird thing is that the data for Louisiana might be affected by Hurricane Katrina. Many people, having overcome trauma, feel a sense of relief and happiness.
Mississippi is a bit backwards, but this just goes to show that people in these states lead simple lives, with less govt intervention and hooplah. They like it that way. Happiness is a journey, not a destination. I think most people think that they will be happy when they get what they want, or acquire all the stuff they think they are entitled to, and many think govt or others are there to provide them with everything from cradle to grave. Make your own life, and your own happiness.
Aside from Maine and Montana... I was operating on the guess that the saddest states are suffering from seasonal affective disorder and that served me pretty well.
I'll admit I thought it was odd that some of the poorest states are among the happiest, but weather-wise it makes a lot of sense. There are probably some other factors I'm missing too.
If you use money as your only gauge of happiness you'll never have enough. Another one of my dad's sayings was, "Too many people in pursuit of their salt forget about their sugar."
No yeah, I definitely agree that money doesn't bring happiness, it's just that lower income tends to correlate with things like poorer health (due to decreased access to healthcare), more stress coming from strain on financial resources, etc., which I would expect to make people less happy. That being said, I acknowledge things like weather, cultures, etc. also contribute to happiness a lot.
How are they delusional? Many people are happy because they have morals and a work ethic, and they love their simple lives and their families and community just fine. Maybe people like you can't find meaning in life and don't know how to be happy.
It seems that the 10 happiest states are the states that have the fewest number of migrants from the 10 unhappiest states list. New Yorkers, Ohio'ans, Marylanders, and Californians don't move to Louisiana, Montana, Tennessee, or Alabama.
I think that says much more about people in unhappy/wealthy states than about Louisiana etc. Maybe the others should learn to appreciate what they have.
Exactly, my initial strategy was to try the richest states (mostly the Northeast), and I only started trying the south once I had gone through most of the other ones.
I really think getting the right number of n's and s's in states like Massachusets and Louisiana shouldn't be a prerequisite for these quizzes, especially when there's a time constraint.
I am personally surprised by some states that made it. Though I have only lived in Florida, I have spent lots of time in Tennessee and had a really unhappy and unpleasant time. I guess most people surveyed are not from the Gatlinburg area.
ah, another quiz that I am able to ace purely by virtue of being able to type every state very quickly. Coulda done it just as easily without knowing what the prompt was.
It may be that happiness is directly related to being able to live far away from snide arrogant folks like you who apparently are unable to grasp what makes other folks truly happy. I happen to live in one of the 10 happiest states after living in 5 of the unhappiest. I am glad to do so - please don't move here and ruin it for everyone else. Thank you.
I mean you SOUND truly happy and unbothered in this comment lol.
Nah, Bdubz is right. I live in one of these states. And yep, the most ignorant and uneducated are usually happier because they don't care about anything going on outside of their myopic lives. Sorry that offends folks like you, but it's an honest observation for a lot of people.
The right-wing people around me don't do "annoying things" like take the time to recycle or bother to even throw their trash in a can half the time because, and this is a direct quote from a neighbor, "What the hell do YOU care if the planet goes to hell when you're dead? har har har". They don't think too much.
And let's think about the fear of death. The super religious folks around me genuinely believe a sky daddy is going to send them to heaven so they will never cease to exist lol. They are probably happier than non-religious people who can't fool themselves about mortality. Duh.
Self-reporting is actually not a great way of measuring these things since I think Southerners are more likely than Northerners to say they're happy when they're not. A better technique would be to measure deaths of despair (drug addiction, alcoholism, suicide)
Remember, big brother is watching
Nah, Bdubz is right. I live in one of these states. And yep, the most ignorant and uneducated are usually happier because they don't care about anything going on outside of their myopic lives. Sorry that offends folks like you, but it's an honest observation for a lot of people.
The right-wing people around me don't do "annoying things" like take the time to recycle or bother to even throw their trash in a can half the time because, and this is a direct quote from a neighbor, "What the hell do YOU care if the planet goes to hell when you're dead? har har har". They don't think too much.
And let's think about the fear of death. The super religious folks around me genuinely believe a sky daddy is going to send them to heaven so they will never cease to exist lol. They are probably happier than non-religious people who can't fool themselves about mortality. Duh.
Sorry, ignorance really is bliss.