With the Independence Day holiday upcoming, WalletHub released a report on 2022’s Most Independent States, with Utah coming out on top. This was determined by comparing the 50 states across 39 metrics and measuring how dependent Americans are on the government and others. The dependency was based on finances, jobs and personal vices.
The findings showed that Utah ranked second in the share of households receiving public assistance and 28th in the share of federal, state and local government employees. Utah was sixth in long-term unemployment rates, 23rd in industry variety and first in the share of current adult smokers.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has been an especially big test of our independence, as for large amounts of time Americans were forced to stay much more isolated from others than usual,” WalletHub shared.
Utah’s total score was 66.03, followed by Colorado in second place at 63.66 and Massachusetts in third at 61.09. On the other hand, Kentucky came in last, at number 50, with a score of 37.29. Utah also ranked second in regard to a percentage of households with rainy-day and emergency funds.