While a little bit of stress can actually be beneficial in certain instances, too much can affect your health and well-being. Nearly everyone feels stressed-out at some point, but there seem to be certain cities where citizens cope better than others, so suggests WalletHub [1] in a new study.
Let’s take a peek at the stress-related data that WalletHub parsed. In the United States, stress affects upwards of 100 million people, it reports. Money fronts the list of causes, with work, family, and relationships bringing up the rear. And speaking of money and work, workplace-related stress alone costs society over $300 billion annually, according to the report. So it’s little wonder that finding a Zen-like zone to call home is a great idea for many reasons.
To pinpoint the places where Americans deal best with stress, WalletHub compared 182 cities across four dimensions: work stress, financial stress, family stress, and health and safety stress. It then analyzed those dimensions across 37 relevant metrics spanning from average weekly work hours to debt load, divorce, and suicide rates, to name a few. Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with a score of 100 representing the highest levels of stress.
The least-stressed city in the nation, according to WalletHub: Fremont, California, with a total score of 25.93 on the stress scale. Rounding out the top 10 are Bismarck, North Dakota, charting a 26.6, followed by Sioux Falls, South Dakota (28.16); Overland Park, Kansas (29.66); South Burlington, Vermont (30.15); Scottsdale, Arizona (30.28); Irvine, California (30.52); San Jose, California (31.88); Madison, Wisconsin (32.1); and Lincoln, Nebraska (32.15).
On the contrary, the city topping out as the most stressed-out on WalletHub’s ranking: Detroit, Michigan, which garnered a total score of 63.53. Next comes Newark, New Jersey, with a 62.8, trailed by Cleveland, Ohio (60.81); Birmingham, Alabama (58.03); Toledo, Ohio (57.42); Baltimore, Maryland (56.94); Wilmington, Delaware (55.25); Milwaukee, Wisconsin (55.02); Gulfport, Mississippi (54.82); and St. Louis, Missouri (53.57).