When I’ve written about Freedom in the 50 States (as I did in 2016, 2019, and 2022), it seems that Florida and New Hampshire routinely get the best scores.
Well, the same is true for the latest edition. As you can see from this map, New Hampshire is the nation’s most libertarian state with Florida in second place.
To calculate the rankings, Freedom in the 50 States measures both economic freedom and personal freedom.
If we look solely at economic freedom, we can say that New Hampshire is both the most libertarian state and the most laissez-faire state.
Once again, Florida win the runner-up prize (and South Dakota is in third place in both rankings).
The worst states, in both rankings, are New York, Hawaii, and California. No big surprises.
For number geeks, let’s look at the scores for each state.
Here is the data for overall freedom.
And here is the data for economic freedom.
I suppose we should give a consolation prize to Tennessee, which just barely missed out being in the top 5 on both lists.
And New Jersey and Oregon deserve a booby prize for being in the bottom 5 on both lists.
I always like looking at trends. If we look at what’s happened to economic freedom over time, there’s good news and bad news.
On the positive side, the average level of economic freedom is higher today than it was about 20 years ago. On the negative side, average scores have plummeted since 2020.
Both the above numbers are just averages, so we don’t know which states are getting better or worse.
So here’s one final visual. The publication highlights changes in overall freedom in selected states.
Interestingly, there is policy divergence. The worst-performing states are getting worse over time while the top states are getting better over time.
If you want to know why that matters, check out the data on how Americans are voting with their feet.
