Country Music Study Shows Which States Are Most Like A Country Song

Estately’s country music study is taking the web by storm today, ranking from one to 51 the states (and District of Columbia) on how similar each is to a country music song.

Not surprisingly, the No. 1 winner (or loser, depending on your viewpoint) is Oklahoma. With an average rank of 11.0, Sooner Country scored high in a number of individual categories including the following:

Works until the day is through (10th)

Supports the troops (14th)

Miles of dirt roads (11th)

Hall of Fame country musicians (6th)

Cowboys and cowgirls (4th)

Religion (9th)

Baby done left (percentage of men and women who are divorced or separated — 4th, though another study says highest in nation)

Beer and liquor intake (38th)

Pickup truck owners (6th)

Taken collectively, Oklahoma’s overall score was able to edge out that of Texas (No. 2 with an average rank of 14.44). It also beat out Missouri (No. 3), Louisiana (No. 4), and Arkansas (No. 5), with Kansas, North Dakota, Kentucky, South Dakota, and Alabama, rounding out the top ten (Nos. 6 through 10, respectively).

In contrast, the lowest ranking on this country music study was New Jersey, which scored an average rank of 43.13.

New Jersey scored 50th in the “Pickup truck owners” and “Baby done left” categories and dead last (51st) in the “Hall of Fame country musicians” category.

The rest of the bottom 10 (from Nos. 50 through 42) were the following: Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, District of Columbia, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Utah, and California.

For the full methodology, here’s each category broken down in further description from the Estately website:

Pickup Trucks: Pickup truck sales for January-April 2014. (Source: Auto experts at Edmunds.com provided analysis of Polk registrations (January-April 2014), which measures all large truck vehicles registered to a retail buyer (excluding fleet sales).

Drinkin’: Per capita beer and liquor consumption (source: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism).

Baby Done Left: Percentage of men and women who are divorced or separated (source: U.S. Census).

Most religious: Percentage of population that says religion is an important part of their daily life (source: Gallup Poll).

Cowboys and Cowgirls: Since there’s no cowboy directory we simply measured the number of cattle and calves per square mile (source: CattleRange.com).

Hall of Fame Country Musicians: Number of country musicians in the Country Music Hall of Fame who were born in each state (source: Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum).

Dirt Roads: Miles of unpaved roads managed by the Federal Highway Administration (source: Federal Highway Administration). Does not include private roads or Forest Service/BLM roads.

Supports the Troops: Active military personnel in each state (source: Census.gov).

Works Until the Day Is Through: Ranked from lowest unemployment rate to highest (source: Bureau of Labor Statistics).

Where did your state rank in the country music study? Play along in our comments section.

[Images via Estately, linked above]