What is the worst state in America?

[Ben Kenobi]

I'd like to see the mathematical explanation for why 4 of the 101 poorest towns in America are in California and 38 out of 101 are in Texas.

The real question is why does CA have only 4.

This list is going to be very sensitive to a couple things:

1, large in-state disparity in income.
2, size of the state total.
3, distribution of the population within the state
4, overall average of state income.

CA is a very expensive, high cost of living state and poorly compensated for COL. It's also not a very rural state either - most of the population lives in cities.

Texas, as a median income state wih high population, widely spread out and rural state would be expected to dominate a measure like this, even though Texas as a whole is well compensated. Texas is the first southern state (not counting VA after the VA/WVA state split), to come into the top half of incomes in America.

[giblets]

The question was, "why do you have to go 100 towns to get to eastern Kentucky".

Eastern KY has about 750k people. Out of 300 million people, you'd expect to see about 30x as many from CA + TX than you would from KY. You'd expect to have to go about 500 places assuming:

1, equal distribution of income across all populations. So the fact that Eastern KY is represented in the top 100 is significant. The fact that 38 are Texas demonstrates that the ratio is not out of line.

THat was about as entertaining as I thought it would be.

[giblets]

The real question is why does CA have only 4.

This list is going to be very sensitive to a couple things:

1, large in-state disparity in income.
2, size of the state total.
3, distribution of the population within the state
4, overall average of state income.

CA is a very expensive, high cost of living state and poorly compensated for COL. It's also not a very rural state either - most of the population lives in cities.

Texas, as a median income state wih high population, widely spread out and rural state would be expected to dominate a measure like this, even though Texas as a whole is well compensated. Texas is the first southern state (not counting VA after the VA/WVA state split), to come into the top half of incomes in America.

Texas is not a "rural state" you massive ******. Nice research.

[Ben Kenobi]

Texas is not a "rural state" you massive ******. Nice research.

Texas has about half of their rural population in places under 2.5k. This is very different from California. California has less than a quarter.

This alone will explain most of the discreprency. TX's rural population is much more spread out than CA's. CA only has about 3 million people in rural areas under 2.5k. Texas has 5 million.

So yes, Texas is much more of a rural state than CA.

[PLATO]

Ben...that is not a correct analysis. Not going to argue with you, but you have several flaws in how you are analyzing it.

[Ben Kenobi]

Not going to argue with you, but you have several flaws in how you are analyzing it.

The other half is assuming a normal distribution; large samples of individual rural cities are all going to lean heavily towards the larger states all else being equal. You're only pulling out the poorest cities. Larger samples are more likely to have outliers. It's the same reason most of the 100 are small towns, because the smaller the sample, the more likely it's going to get pulled away from the average income of the US.

I'd have to go into it more to see whether 38 is statistically significant deviation.

Anyways, where have I gone wrong? I'm curious.

[Dinner]

The real question is why does CA have only 4.

Because it is a far better place than a state like Texas? The numbers don't lie, son, even if you do.

[Tuberski]

Because it is a far better place than a state like Texas? The numbers don't lie, son, even if you do.

Especially for car thieves, 8 of the top 10 cities with the most car theft are in California, the other 2 are in Washington.

ACK!

[SlowwHand]

And the biggest idiot is also in California. Game over.

[Dinner]

If you look at "worst" as being an indicator of per capita income:


You have to get to #100 on the list before you find an Eastern Kentucky town. I was a bit surprised by this. Was even more surprised by the number of California and Texas towns on the list.

Most of those California towns are virtually empty ghost towns in extremely isolated places.

[Dinner]

Especially for car thieves, 8 of the top 10 cities with the most car theft are in California, the other 2 are in Washington.

ACK!

Modesto, Fresno, Bakersfield... Those are all crappy red districts in the central valley. Basically just a combination of poor white trash and illegal farm laborers.

[Dinner]

And the biggest idiot is also in California. Game over.

Ben is actually in Texas, Sloww.

[Guynemer]

How many of those towns are within and/or bordering reservations?

[Dinner]

Several including the #1 on the list. The reservations in the Dakotas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico are often described as some of the poorest places in America being even worse off than Appalachia.

BTW many of the places, like Tobin, CA, can't really be called towns as Tobin's total population is 11 people and it is essentially a place where three crazy white families go to live in isolation from everything else. It's surrounded by national forest land without any other settlements any where near it. My guess is they farm and/or subsistence hunt and don't want anything to do with the outside world and that's why they picked one of the most isolated and rural parts of the state to live in.

[PLATO]

Most of those California towns are virtually empty ghost towns in extremely isolated places.

Yes...I thought that was odd as well. It does seem they are anomalies, but it is still interesting that there are some pockets of severe poverty in the golden state.