How "Free" is your state? Personal & Economic Freedom rankings by state.
My state (Indiana) is ranked #3 in the US. New York is ranked dead last at #50 out of 50. Surprisingly the state of Alaska is ranked #44.
Below is the map that shows your state's freedom, but if you click on the link above it will take you to the interactive map where you can see your state's actual ranking.
My state (Indiana) is ranked #3 in the US. New York is ranked dead last at #50 out of 50. Surprisingly the state of Alaska is ranked #44.
From a 2009 study: LINK => http://www.legalzoom.com/everyday-law/home-leisure/how-free-is-your-state
But here is a more updated study, dated from 2011 with an interactive map => http://mercatus.org/freedom-50-states-2011How Free Is Your State? The Nation's Most Libertarian States
LISA C. JOHNSON - JUL 2009
Under the US Constitution, each state has control over many of the laws and regulations within its own borders. Consequently, laws vary widely among states, with some states allowing open containers of alcohol in vehicles and others prohibiting raw milk sales and demanding helmets for bicycle riders. How free is your home state? Find out below.
Freedom in the 50 States: An Index of Personal and Economic Freedom, a recent paper published by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University explores the idea of personal and economic freedom in each of the 50 states. The paper defines individual freedom as "the ability to dispose of one's own life, liberty, and justly acquired property however one sees fit, so long as one does not coercively infringe on another individual's ability to do the same."
States were rated on economic freedom and personal freedom. Economic freedom covers government spending and taxation, labor regulations, eminent domain, occupational licensing, etc. Personal freedom includes things like helmet and seatbelt laws, home-school regulations, gun laws, and alcohol and marijuana regulations...
This study comprehensively ranks the American states on their public policies that affect individual freedoms in the economic, social, and personal spheres. It updates, expands, and improves upon our inaugural 2009 Freedom in the 50 States study. For this new edition, we have added more policy variables (such as bans on trans fats and the audio recording of police, Massachusetts’s individual health-insurance mandate, and mandated family leave), improved existing measures (such as those for fiscal policies, workers’ compensation regulations, and asset-forfeiture rules), and developed specific policy prescriptions for each of the 50 states based on our data and a survey of state policy experts. With a consistent time series, we are also able to discover for the first time which states have improved and worsened in regard to freedom recently. . .
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Fiscal Policy ...
Regulatory Policy ...
Paternalism ...
etc...