{"id":5454,"date":"2026-06-09T18:00:26","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T15:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/?p=5454"},"modified":"2026-06-09T18:00:26","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T15:00:26","slug":"red-states-see-biggest-gains-in-best-places-to-raise-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/red-states-see-biggest-gains-in-best-places-to-raise-kids\/","title":{"rendered":"Red States See Biggest Gains in Best Places to Raise Kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Carolina leads the nation with the most significant gains in childhood welfare between 2019 and 2024, as New York Post<\/em> reports, based on findings from the 2026 “Kids Count” study published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation.<\/p>\n

Joining the Palmetto State at the top of the improvement rankings are Louisiana<\/strong>, Mississippi<\/strong>, Kentucky<\/strong>, and New Mexico<\/strong>\u2014four out of five of which voted decisively for President Trump in the 2024 election.<\/p>\n

South Carolina Posts 38-Point Jump<\/h2>\n

South Carolina recorded a 38-point increase in its overall childhood well-being score, which the foundation calculates using 16 separate metrics including premature death rates, low birth weight instances, educational proficiency levels, and poverty statistics.<\/p>\n

The state, which supported President Trump by a margin of 58 to 40 percent in November 2024, was among only three states nationwide that avoided a decline in education rankings over the five-year period examined by the study.<\/p>\n

Educational performance held steady in South Carolina while actually improving in just two states: Louisiana and Mississippi. Both Deep South states have earned recognition for achieving stronger gains in reading and mathematics scores than wealthier Northeastern states.<\/p>\n

Deep South Outpaces Wealthy Blue States<\/h2>\n

The report reveals a striking pattern: Southern states achieved the greatest regional gains despite continuing to occupy many of the lowest overall positions in absolute childhood well-being scores.<\/p>\n

Among the 15 states showing improvement between 2019 and 2024, eight were located in the South, with South Carolina, Louisiana, and Kentucky posting the strongest advances.<\/p>\n

Kentucky delivered notable gains in both economic well-being and education, cementing its position among the most improved states. Mississippi registered improvements across family and community metrics, economic well-being, and education.<\/p>\n

The Mississippi Miracle Goes National<\/h2>\n

Mississippi now ranks 16th nationwide in education, a dramatic reversal that the report attributes to deliberate policy choices. The state passed the Literacy-Based Promotion Act, which emphasizes reading proficiency by third grade, and sustained significant investments in public schooling.<\/p>\n

The so-called “Mississippi Miracle” has begun attracting attention from progressive states including California, which itself ranks 33rd out of 50 states in the foundation’s childhood well-being assessment.<\/p>\n

New York placed 30th in the rankings and saw its childhood well-being score decline between 2019 and 2024, while California remained flat during the same period.<\/p>\n

Blue States Show Steepest Declines<\/h2>\n

The sharpest deterioration in child well-being occurred in Northeastern and Midwestern states, according to the data.<\/p>\n

Maine<\/strong> experienced the largest drop in child well-being since 2019, followed by four Midwestern states: Nebraska<\/strong>, North Dakota<\/strong>, Iowa<\/strong>, and Minnesota<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

North Dakota, Maine, Delaware, Iowa, and Oklahoma posted the steepest losses in educational attainment. Maine also recorded the greatest decline in child health outcomes.<\/p>\n

Of the five states recognized for the strongest improvements, only New Mexico supported Kamala Harris in the most recent presidential election. That state saw substantial improvement in economic well-being and expanded its state child tax credit in 2023.<\/p>\n

Mixed National Picture Under Biden<\/h2>\n

The Annie E. Casey Foundation described the nationwide data as showing a mixed and uneven picture of child well-being across America.<\/p>\n

While teen birth rates and child poverty declined during the five-year study period, reading and mathematics proficiency both deteriorated between 2019 and 2024 under former President Joe Biden’s administration.<\/p>\n

Overall, 29 states experienced declines in child well-being since 2019, underscoring the uneven nature of post-pandemic recovery across different regions and political environments.<\/p>\n

The top five states for overall childhood well-being in 2024 were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Utah, Vermont, and Minnesota. The five lowest-ranked states were Mississippi, New Mexico, Louisiana, Alaska, and Nevada, with Texas also among the bottom tier.<\/p>\n

With information from New York Post<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Four conservative states led by South Carolina have shown the strongest improvements in child well-being since COVID-19, while wealthier blue states lagged behind in the Annie E. Casey Foundation study.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":5453,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[5912,5908,5909,5913,5914,5911,5910,4348,4740,4349,2243],"nfg_topic":[135],"class_list":["post-5454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-annie-e-casey-foundation","tag-blue-states","tag-child-well-being","tag-covid-19-pandemic","tag-educational-recovery","tag-kentucky","tag-louisiana","tag-mississippi","tag-new-mexico","tag-red-states","tag-south-carolina","nfg_topic-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5454"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5454\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5502,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5454\/revisions\/5502"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5454"},{"taxonomy":"nfg_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nfg_topic?post=5454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}