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Tennessee falls back in 2024 ‘Best States’ rankings. See where it lands in U.S. News and World Reports’ annual list

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U.S. News and World Reports has released its “Best States of 2024” list, which measures how well states perform for their citizens. The ranking takes into consideration multiple factors including a state’s economy, public safety, education, and others.

Tennessee took the No. 27 spot, ranking in the middle of the pack, however, the Volunteer State fell behind three places from last year’s ranking. In 2023, Tennessee ranked as No. 24, climbing up five spots from No. 29 in 2022. Some neighboring states fared slightly better with North Carolina coming in at No. 19, Georgia at No. 18 and Virginia coming in at No. 13.

According to U.S. News and World Reports, more weight was given to some categories than others, based on a survey of what matters most to residents, for example health care and education. Then came state economies, infrastructure, and the opportunity states offer their citizens. Fiscal stability followed closely, along with measures of crime and corrections and a state’s natural environment.

U.S. News and World Reports: Tennessee ranks as 27th best state

According to the study, the Volunteer State performed best in fiscal stability (No. 5), economy (No. 12) and infrastructure (No. 21). On the other end of the spectrum, the state performed poorly in healthcare (No. 42), crime and corrections (No. 42) and natural environment (No. 34).

Tennessee ranked No. 22 in opportunity and No. 31 in education.

U.S. News and World Reports: Top 10 best states of 2024

  1. Utah
  2. New Hampshire
  3. Nebraska
  4. Minnesota
  5. Idaho
  6. Iowa
  7. Vermont
  8. Washington
  9. Florida
  10. Massachusetts

U.S. News and World Reports: Top 10 worst states of 2024

  1. Pennsylvania
  2. South Carolina
  3. Michigan
  4. Oklahoma
  5. Alabama
  6. Alaska
  7. West Virginia
  8. Arkansas
  9. Mississippi
  10. New Mexico
  11. Louisiana

Methodology

In order to determine the best and worst states, U.S. News and World Report ranked each of the 50 states in 71 metrics across eight categories. Those categories included healthcare (15.97%), education (15.94%), economy (13.36%), infrastructure (12.93%), opportunity (12.29%), fiscal stability (11.36%), crime and corrections (9.16%), and natural environment (8.99%).

Each category was assigned an individual weight based on the average of three years of data from national surveys. The surveys asked nearly 70,000 people to prioritize each subject in their state.

U.S. News created an index score for each metric for each state. In each metric, the state that performed the best in the metric was given 100 points, the state that performed the worst was given 0 points and states between these were indexed proportionally. Metric index scores were averaged to determine subcategory scores and rankings. Then, subcategory scores were averaged to determine category scores and rankings.

For the overall best states rankings, U.S. News created a weighted average of the eight category rankings using the weight for each category as determined by the survey, and then ranked the outcome.

Diana Leyva covers trending news and service journalism for The Tennessean. Contact her at Dleyva@gannett.com or follow her on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, at @_leyvadiana

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