Least-Educated State: 2,471,189 California Residents 25 and Older Never Completed 9th Grade; Highest Percentage in Nation California once again ranked No. 1 among the 50 states for the percentage of its residents 25 and older who have never completed ninth grade and 50th for the percentage who have at least graduated from high school, according to new five-year estimates (2014-2018 ) released Thursday by the Census Bureau's American Community Survey. California, as CNSNews.com reported last year, also ranked No. 1 for the percentage who never completed ninth grade and No. 50 for the percentage who had graduated from high school in the five-year estimates (2013-2017) the Census Bureau released in December 2018. In California, according to the new five-year estimate, 2,471,189 residents 25 and older had never completed ninth grade. https://www.cnsnews.com/article/national/terence-p-jeffrey/least-educated-state-2471189-californians-25-and-older-never Take a look at the ranking of states in that bar graph: California Leads Nation in Percentage of Residents 25 and Older Who Never Finished 9th Grade 1. California - 9.4 2. Texas - 8.5 3. New York - 6.3 4. New Mexico - 6.2 ... 8. Mississippi - 5.4 ... 47. Vermont - 2.3 48. New Hampshire - 2.2 49. Montana - 2 50. Wyoming - 1.9 Not what one would expect, is it? The first thing I notice is that this does not seem to have much obvious correlation to Red/Blue states. Vermont and New Hampshire are pretty notable in that demographically and economically the two states are nearly identical, it's just that Vermont became politically progressive while the culture in New Hampshire is the opposite. These two states have often been pointed to by sociologists and political researchers as a useful petri dish to observe any differences that might be caused by Red/Blue political culture. (see thread for further information about that here: Why Vermont is Blue ) California and Texas both have had high levels of illegal immigration.
Keep in mind Wyoming is very conservative. Let's not forget this was the state that was complaining about the federal government coming in and taking away their machine guns. Yet it ranks second to the bottom of the list, at number 49. New Hampshire is a little bit of a more complicated case. It has a more conservative culture. Some claim "white trash". It doesn't fit in with the rest of New England. Although politically the state has recently tipped blue. If one looks at a political map, the majority of the counties in the state are still red. They tend to value political liberty but have gone back and forth electing both Democrat and Republican governors for several decades. The Presidential election in the state was extremely close, with Trump getting 47.25% of the votes, and Hillary getting 47.62%.
This is basically a poll of which states are the whitest. And with the fewest illegal immigrants. Like I said California is number 12 in college educated.
