Americans have a long-standing reputation for hard work, and recently someone set out to find which state was the hardest working. Bad News for the Constitution State, we stink at working.

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Wallet Hub ran the study using stats from the World Economic Forum to rank all 50 states in the U.S. from 1-50 and when all the counting and crying was done Alaska was ranked #1 in America for hard work, while my home state of Connecticut came in at #47.

How about our neighbors?

  • New York - 48
  • New Jersey - 42

The Hub used two key factors to set the list, "Direct Work Factors" and "Indirect Work Factors." There were ten more specific categories and each was considered under the "direct," "indirect" umbrellas, each given a point value, you shake it all up in a bag and the answers came spilling out the other side. Some of the specific metrics that were analyzed were:

  • Average work hours
  • Average commute
  • Average Leisure Time
  • Share of Households Where No Adults Work

Was I surprised to hear that my home state of CT did poorly? Frankly, no I was not, unfortunately things seem to be on the decline in CT. What are "things?" Everything, I look around I see people who are not happy, businesses struggling and a general decline in our way of life compared to what it once was.

Now, I'm just one person observing and saying what I feel, it's not very scientific and the study Wallet Hub did seems pretty scientific in comparison.

However, Wallet Hub did not make any consideration in their study for a metric that would turn the results upside down, pace of life, pace of work, intensity of work. That is three three things but they are all really one.

I've said it before and I will say it again, the pace that people maintain in the Tri-State area, is unmatched anywhere else in this country. If you can keep up here, you can do it anywhere.

Let's take a state that did well on the study like North Dakota for instance which was ranked #2 in the nation for hard work. If you took the average worker from North Dakota and moved them to the Northeast, and gave them the same job, would they perform as well here, as they did at home? Would they even perform up to the standards of an employer in the Northeast?

I think the answer is no, in many cases. I've lived in New York and Connecticut most of my adult life but I did move to Florida for awhile and I saw a different way of doing things, a much slower, less efficient environment and culture in the office.

My wife and I also made friends with a couple that moved here from California a few years back. Both the husband and wife admitted that the transition in the workplace was one of the hardest things they've ever done. The husband told me that on his first day of work, he was certain he'd made a mistake by moving East.

They could not believe how fast people spoke, how they acted on a task right after it was presented and how little downtime there was in their respective jobs in CT. The pace here (CT, New York, New Jersey), and the intensity of the work environment can break you if you are not used to it.

So, yeah I'm defending my people and sounding like a homer but please, Oklahoma was #7 on the list, I dare someone from OK, to attempt to survive my daily routine. I'm not talking about farmers, I'm not a farmer. I mean apples to apples, same industry, person versus person, the Northeast wins every time.

Source: WalletHub

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