50 maps that explain how America lives, spends, and believes

The US is a massive country, and its 327 million people are scattered across a vast expanse of land. This map shows how many people per square mile live in each county, with the darker blue indicating big cities and their suburbs:

The urbanization and suburbanization of the US can be seen even more starkly —50.1% of the country’s population lives in the 238 most densely populated counties, shown here in darker blue:

Big cities in the South and West are quickly increasing in size, while more sparsely populated areas and Northern counties are growing more slowly or shrinking in population.

Americans trace their roots from all over the world. In most Northern states, a plurality of residents described themselves as having German ancestry, while more residents of states along the US-Mexico border described themselves as Mexican. African American was the most common self-identified ancestry throughout much of the Deep South.

Access to healthcare comes with a cost. Total healthcare burdens — the combined cost of premiums and out-of-pocket deductible costs — ranged from about $5,400 in Michigan to almost $8,300 in New Hampshire per year.

The high and rising cost of healthcare in the US is a perennial political issue. Most of the Democratic presidential candidates have put forward plans to address costs through increased government coverage.

The candidates are roughly split into two camps, with several, including former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, favoring some form of a “public option” for uninsured Americans to be able to buy in to federal insurance programs like Medicare and Medicaid. Meanwhile, the more left-leaning candidates, like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have proposed a “Medicare for All” plan that would largely end private insurance in favor of a federal single-payer system.

Read more: How much your healthcare costs in all 50 states

Families in the West tend to be larger than Northeastern families.

Just over four years ago, the Supreme Court handed down a landmark decision making same-sex marriage the law of the land, and LGBT families are thriving.

The first map shows estimates of how many people in each state identify as LGBT, based on an analysis of polling data from Gallup. The second map shows the share of same-sex couples raising children.

Intriguingly, states with smaller self-identified LGBT populations largely tend to have a higher share of same-sex families raising children.

Colleges and universities in the Northeast and West tend to have higher rates of on-time graduation than other states.

A Business Insider analysis of data from the Department of Education looked at the average six-year completion rate for first-time full-time students at four-year colleges and universities based in each state.

Massachusetts’ colleges had the highest average graduation rate, with 73.5% of students seeking a four-year degree finishing within six years.

Arizona had the lowest rate, with just 26.3% of students finishing on time. However, the mostly online University of Phoenix is included in Arizona’s Department of Education data. Excluding that school, the state’s average graduation rate improved to a much higher 50.9%.

Read more: The 15 US states with the lowest college graduation rates

Like healthcare, higher education in the US can be very expensive. The average student debt held by new graduates ranged from about $19,000 in Utah to over $38,000 in Connecticut.

While milestones like getting an education and raising a family are big parts of Americans’ lives, heartbreak is as well. Marriages sometimes end, and states deal with how to split up marital property in different ways.

Faith is a big part of many Americans’ lives, especially in the traditional Bible Belt states.

The Pew Research Center’s 2014 Religious Landscape Survey analyzed religious beliefs and habits of Americans. The above map shows the share of each state’s population that Pew identified as being “highly religious” based on four measures of religious behavior: attending weekly services, praying daily, believing in God with absolute certainty, and saying that religion was important in their lives.

New England had a relatively low share of “highly religious” respondents in Pew’s survey, with about a third of the populations of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts self-identifying with the above devout behaviors.

Meanwhile, over three quarters of Southern states like Missouri and Alabama were highly religious, according to Pew’s definition.

The right to an abortion remains a hotly contested issue in American politics. A newly more conservative Supreme Court could overrule the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that has secured that right for decades.

The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration involves the use of hundreds of detention centers for migrants across the US.

Trump’s approval ratings have declined in most states since his inauguration.

The polling firm Morning Consult tracks Trump’s monthly approval rating in each US state. In the map above, states in blue have a net negative approval rating (that is, more residents disapproving of Trump than approving), while states in orange have a net positive rating.

As of May, Trump’s net approval is negative in several of the key swing states that helped his surprise 2016 election victory, including Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

An emerging hot-button issue is convict voting rights. While many states continue to permanently bar felons from voting, a trend toward restoring rights after convicts have served their time is gaining steam.

Most states require some form of identification for voters to be able to cast a ballot.

The death penalty is another perennial hot-button issue in American politics. Several states still actively execute prisoners convicted of capital crimes, though a number of states have recently restricted the penalty.

Marijuana legalization has been on the upswing in recent years. As of last month, 10 states allow sales of recreational and legal marijuana.

In many states, the lowest-paying occupation, as measured by average annual wages, is in the food-service industry.

The “Fight for $15” movement, largely made up of fast-food and other food-service workers, has been pushing for higher minimum wages and increased pay and better working conditions. The labor-backed movement, which began in 2012, has called for cities, states, and the federal government to raise minimum wages to $15 per hour.

Read more: Here is the lowest-paying job in every US state

America runs on a massive $20 trillion economy, and about two-thirds of that economy is consumer spending. The country’s biggest companies — massive employers and household brand names alike — have headquarters scattered across the US.

The main measure of economic output, gross domestic product, totals up the value of all goods and services sold in a state. That measure, adjusted by population, is a good indicator of the overall economic health of a state.

Even though they tend to have stronger job opportunities and higher wages, large metro areas also have a much higher cost of living than smaller cities and rural areas.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis publishes an annual measure of the relative cost of living across the US. In 2017, the San Jose metro area in California was about 31% more expensive than the national average.

New York City’s metro area was about 22% more expensive than average.

Read more: The 15 most expensive cities in America

While the homeless population declined in most states between 2007 and 2017, rising housing costs have contributed to increases in some states, particularly in New York.

Another dreaded expenditure is taxes. While federal taxes apply across the board, states also set their own tax rates, and there’s a wide range of how much tax revenue per person each state takes in.

Many of the states with higher per capita tax revenues fall in the traditionally liberal and urban Northeast and West Coast.

Not all the tax revenue listed above comes from individual taxpayers or businesses. Some resource-heavy states, like North Dakota, had very high revenues from severance taxes levied on oil, gas, and other resources that are shipped out of the state.

Read more: The best and worst states to live in for taxes

Finally, putting everything together, this map shows how Americans in every state rate their own overall happiness and well-being.

The drafters of the Declaration of Independence made sure to list fundamental rights as those of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Since then, working hard to attain the good life has become a cornerstone of the American dream.

The above map shows how Americans in each state rate their own happiness, as measured by a Gallup-Sharecare index of overall well-being.

The index is based on five indicators of a happy, healthy, and secure life: a sense of purpose, a supportive social network, financial security, feeling safe and happy in one’s community, and being in generally good health.

By Gallup’s measure, Louisiana and West Virginia were struggling, with the lowest average scores on the well-being index. But on the happier end of the scale, South Dakota was the state with the highest overall average well-being, followed by Vermont.