Hometown Numbers

USA stats

National figures for the United States, from the same sources the Georgia livability components use — published national values, never averages of county values and never Georgia values.

• States — 50.
• Counties & county equivalents — 3,144 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates coverage, 50 states + District of Columbia (territorial equivalents excluded). Census Bureau, 2020–2024 ACS stories.
• Municipal governments — 19,491 — U.S. Census Bureau, 2022 Census of Governments, Government Organization Summary Report. Census Bureau summary report (PDF).
• Total population — 334,922,499 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates.
• Median household income — $80,734 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, table B19013.
• Median home value — $332,700 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, table B25077.
• Housing affordability (median home value ÷ median household income) — 4.1 — computed from the two published medians above; the same construction as the Georgia index's housing component.
• Mean travel time to work — 26.4 minutes — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, mean travel time to work (table S0801).
• Unemployment rate — 4.0% — U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Local Area Unemployment Statistics, 2024 annual average (USDL-25-0294). BLS release.
• Violent crime rate — 359.1 per 100,000 inhabitants — Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in the United States 2024, estimated national rate (UCR Summary of Reported Crimes in the Nation, released August 2025).

Not shown: high-school graduation rate and uninsured rate. The County Health Rankings 2025 release publishes those measures at county level, and no defensible national value was verified for this page — so both are omitted rather than substituted.

Livability favorability — how this site scores it

A different meaning of “favorability” from the poll below: this item is about this site's own Livability Index, which scores a county on seven public-record measures. It is not a poll of public opinion, and it is not a national ranking.

How the index scores: each component is scored 0–100 by percentile rank among Georgia counties with a verified value for that component, direction-adjusted so 100 always means most livable (for measures where lower is better, the score is 100 minus the percentile). A county's composite is the mean of its available component scores, rounded to one decimal place. A county needs at least 5 of the 7 components; with fewer, its index is null — never estimated. Rankings are among Georgia counties only.

The published national values for the same components, exactly as shown in USA stats above — these are published national values, not averages of county values and not rankings:

• Median household income — $80,734 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, table B19013.
• Median home value — $332,700 — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, table B25077.
• Housing affordability (median home value ÷ median household income) — 4.1 — computed from the two published medians above; the same construction as the Georgia index's housing component.
• Mean travel time to work — 26.4 minutes — U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates, mean travel time to work (table S0801).
• Unemployment rate — 4.0% — U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Local Area Unemployment Statistics, 2024 annual average (USDL-25-0294).
• Violent crime rate — 359.1 per 100,000 inhabitants — Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in the United States 2024, estimated national rate (UCR Summary of Reported Crimes in the Nation, released August 2025).

Not shown here either: high-school graduation rate and uninsured rate — no defensible national value was verified for USA stats, so none is shown here. The index's county scores for those two components are Georgia percentile ranks, not national figures.

Georgia leaders — Georgia only, within Georgia's 159 counties. No national county ranking exists on this site yet, and nothing here is one:

• Oconee County — 82.1 (#1 in Georgia).
• Lee County — 78.7 (#2 in Georgia).
• Chattahoochee County and Harris County — 75.1 each (tied #3 in Georgia).

Polling favorability — how Americans rate local government

A different meaning of “favorability” from the index above: this item is a poll of public opinion — what Americans say about their local government — not a score computed from public records, and not a county ranking.

Source: Gallup, “Trust in Federal Government Sinks to New Depths” — Gallup's annual Governance poll, conducted September 1–17, 2026, published October 13, 2026. Gallup reports the trend in local trust has generally been stable, ranging between 63% and 77% since 1972.