The American Human Development Project’s new report measures the well being of US citizens based on education, health, and income. Unsurprisingly, being an American is much better for some than others.
Of the ten states with the highest median earnings, six are in the Northeast while the rest are just south of there. A whopping 46% of Texas’ 29th District (East Houston) never graduated from high school, compared to a drop out rate of only 5% in California’s 30th District, which includes Beverly Hills and Malibu.
How well off are you? Test yourself here. Want more? Watch this.
The report may be telling us what some of us already know about our abysmal health care system—that we spend more per person than any other nation only to die younger than basically all of Western Europe—but when the life expectancy of residents in Kentucky’s Fifth District is 73 years (same as our national average was in 1978), hard numbers are still sobering.
—Brittney Andres
