Study: Massachusetts Misses The Top 20 When It Comes To FUN

Here's a weird question, residents of the Beautiful Berkshires: Would you consider Massachusetts to be a "fun" state? Whether it's "everyday life" or for a vacation getaway, does the Bay State offer a whole lot of "fun" options?

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Recently, the personal finance experts at WalletHub conducted a "fun" study looking at the most fun states in the country. As a resident of the Commonwealth, how do you think Massachusetts ranked?

To come up with the results, the WalletHub team looked at all 50 states and compared them across 26 different metrics. They looked at such things as the number of nightlife options per capita, the number of amusement parks, the number of movie theaters plus movie costs, national park accessibility, etc.

Sadly, Massachusetts did not even make the top 20. Please don't misunderstand me, Massachusetts did not perform terribly. As a matter of fact, Massachusetts ranked in the top 5 in two categories (highest personal spending on recreation services per capita and the number of marinas per capita).

Overall, Massachusetts was ranked the 28th most fun state. Yeah, we could have done better but at least we didn't land in the bottom 5, or worse yet, #50! Mississippi, by the way, was ranked dead last.

Here are the top 10 for "2023's Most Fun States in America" according to WalletHub:

California
Florida
Nevada
New York
Illinois
Colorado
Texas
Washington
Minnesota
Louisiana

Another interesting item from the "fun" study is that New England as a whole did not perform well. Massachusetts at #28 was the highest-ranked New England state. The next closest on the list was Maine which ranked at #41!

It's another fascinating study conducted by WalletHub. Visit their website here to take a look at the full rankings.

LOOK: Here's where people in every state are moving to most

Stacker analyzed the Census Bureau's 2019 American Community Survey data to determine the three most popular destinations for people moving out of each state.

LOOK: Here are the 50 best beach towns in America

Every beach town has its share of pluses and minuses, which got us thinking about what makes a beach town the best one to live in. To find out, Stacker consulted data from WalletHub, released June 17, 2020, that compares U.S. beach towns. Ratings are based on six categories: affordability, weather, safety, economy, education and health, and quality of life. The cities ranged in population from 10,000 to 150,000, but they had to have at least one local beach listed on TripAdvisor. Read the full methodology here. From those rankings, we selected the top 50. Readers who live in California and Florida will be unsurprised to learn that many of towns featured here are in one of those two states.

Keep reading to see if your favorite beach town made the cut.