A new WalletHub study compared all fifty states within five categories to investigate which states are most representative of the U.S. population. The point was to see how much each State resembles the rest of the country as the nation prepares to head to the polls in November to pick the next President. Alabama came in at number forty-eight, just ahead of Mississippi and Utah.
The categories included sociodemographic, economy, education, religion, and public opinion. For sociodemographic Alabama was ranked at number twenty-eight nationally. For economy the State came at twentieth. For education Alabama was at number twenty-five. Religion put Alabama at forty-eight. For public opinion The State was thirty- eight.
Cassandra Happe is a WalletHub analyst. She says that the electoral representation index used an average of twenty-two different metrics for each state to get each number.
“It's really meant to give a context as far as the election primaries go,” she said. “Which states would maybe be a better representation of how the nation is going to feel about a particular candidate.”
Happe says the thing that separates Alabama from other states is its strong religious beliefs and affiliations.
“The one area that Alabama seem to struggle the most in is religion, she mentioned. “And I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. Because what we're seeing is that, compared to the rest of the nation, Alabama seems to have some very strong religious beliefs and a religious affiliation throughout the population.”
Illinois and Florida were the top two states for representing the nation.
