Having a stressful day? Rest assured you likely don’t have it as bad as Alabamians — unless you live in the Yellowhammer state, that is.
A new study released by WalletHub reveals Alabama is the most stressed-out state in the country. Compared to folks in other U.S. states, Alabamians on average have less access to mental health care, possess the lowest credit scores, and log the least sleep.
Following Alabama as the most stressed states were Louisiana, Mississippi, West Virginia and Kentucky. Meanwhile, the least stressed states were Minnesota, North Dakota, Iowa, South Dakota and Utah.
To draw the results, WalletHub analyzed government data to compare all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia on stress related to work, money, family, and health and safety. The personal finance website used a grade-based scale to score each state on its stress level, with 100 being the most stressed, in various areas — like amount worked per week, median income, divorce rate, depression diagnosis rate, and so on. Next, it averaged those scores to calculate a final ranking for each state.
While WalletHub found that Americans today are overall the least stressed they’ve been in a decade, they’re more stressed than they were in 2015. Fear of violence, plus stress over the election outcome, the current political climate, and the uncertain future of the nation all ranked as top stressors in 2016, according to the report.