Report: Georgia ranks No. 2 for stress

Long commutes and low access to health insurance are among the factors contributing to our collective anxiety.

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The folks at Movoto have released a list of the 10 Most Stressed Out States in America, naming Georgia the nation’s runner-up in overall anxiety. Although it doesn’t require a team of researchers to know that living and working in metro Atlanta is filled with stressors—just try making a left on Ivan Allen Boulevard any weekday afternoon—the dataset shows that Georgians in rural areas and smaller cities face their share of challenges, too.

The Movoto stress index quantifies sitting in heavy traffic, working long hours, and struggling to find a job. The real estate blog’s researchers ranked and combined the following factors: percentage of population with a commute exceeding 20 minutes, unemployment rates, average hours worked, population density, percentage of income spent on housing, and percentage of population without health insurance. The list uses data from the U.S. Census’ American Community Survey for 2008-2012 and applies these criteria to the lower 48 states. Georgia ranks in the top (bottom?) 20 for each factor, the foremost being the 23 percent of people who lack health coverage.

Since misery loves company, here is the full list of stressed out states:

  1. Florida
  2. Georgia
  3. New Jersey
  4. California
  5. Nevada
  6. Illinois
  7. New York
  8. Maryland
  9. North Carolina
  10. Arizona

Also, as Movoto observes, coastal states tend to stress out the most, so let’s take a moment to be thankful that at least the Peach State isn’t a peninsula.

You can explore Movoto’s data and interactive maps of stress indicators here.

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  1. wat

    June 9, 2014 at 4:14 pm

    What criteria would make Florida the #1 most stressed state in the country? The report sounds bogus.