2 Wisconsin Cities Rank Among Happiest In United States

MILWAUKEE, WI — While the concept of happiness is an abstract one for many, researchers have found a collection of factors to be key ingredients in the pursuit of a smiley demeanor.

Mental and physical health, strong social connections, job satisfaction and financial well-being have all been shown to be important attributes in staying happy, but have you ever wondered if certain cities in the United States were happier than others?

The personal finance website WalletHub recently released its 2020’s Happiest Cities in America, and Wisconsin had two cities make the list.

Here’s more information about the happiest cities from our state/region:

Milwaukee: 157th in U.S.

• Emotional & physical well-being rank: 127
• Income & employment rank: 178
• Community & environment rank: 151

Madison: 5th in U.S.

• Emotional & physical well-being rank: 5
• Income & employment rank: 21
• Community & environment rank: 13

Fremont, California, was ranked as the happiest city in the United States, according to WalletHub, followed by Plano, Texas, and San Jose, California.

At the other end of the rankings, Detroit, Michigan, finished as the least happy city in the United States. The bottom five were rounded out by Charleston, West Virginia, Toledo, Ohio, Huntington, West Virginia, and Cleveland, Ohio.

Money can only make you so happy, according to a report from the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Researchers from the organization found that people who make $75,000 a year won’t get any higher satisfaction from earning more than that amount.

WalletHub compared 182 of the largest cities in the United States across 30 relevant metrics, including depression rate, sports participation rate and job satisfaction.

Each relevant metric was then listed with its corresponding weight, and the cities were subsequently graded on a 100-point scale, with a score of 100 representing the happiest city possible.

Here are the 10 happiest cities in the United States in 2020, according to WalletHub:

1. Fremont, California: 75.32
2. Plano, Texas: 73.23
3. San Jose. California: 73.20
4. Irvine, California: 72.81
5. Madison, Wisconsin: 72.19
6. Sioux Falls, South Dakota: 70.26
7. Huntington Beach, California: 69.90
8. Scottsdale, Arizona: 69.49
9. Santa Rosa, California: 69.33
10. Pearl City, Hawaii: 69.13

You can find the full list of happy cities on WalletHub.