How Patriotic Is New Jersey?
WalletHub has compiled the data to find out how each state in the country ranks when it comes to patriotism.
They used two main categories: Military Engagement and Civic Engagement. Those two are broken down further:
- Military Engagement
- Average Military Enlistees per 1,000 Civilian Adults Between 2012 & 2017
- Veterans per 1,000 Civilian Adults
- Active-Duty Military Personnel per 100,000 Civilian Adults
- Share of Civilian Adult Population in Military Reserves
- Civic Engagement
- Share of Adults Who Voted in 2016 Presidential Election
- Share of Adults Who Voted in 2016 Primary Elections
- Volunteer Rate
- Volunteer Hours per Resident
- AmeriCorps Volunteers per Capita
- Peace Corps Volunteers per Capita
- Trial & Grand-Jury Participation per Civilian Adult Population
- Share of Residents Who Participate in Groups or Organizations
- Civics Education
So once you crunch all those numbers, where does NJ land? DEAD LAST.
That's right, we are the LEAST patriotic state in the Union. We rank 48th in Military Engagement, and 45th in Civic Engagement. We combined for a total score of 21.55, while New York edged us to come in at 49th with a score of 21.63. Coming in at #1 is New Hampshire, tripling our score with 63.08.
Look, obviously this is just some random website, no one is saying that YOU specifically are not proud to be an American or anything...but when you look at the actual numbers, when it comes to voter turnout and veterans per capita, NJ just doesn't have strong numbers.
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