Anxious at Work? Not Sleeping? Feeling Burned Out? Your State Might Be to Blame…
We all try to achieve it, but the term “work life balance” is often an elusive concept to us – more of a wish than an actual goal. For business owners, it generally comes down to simple math: the more hours you work, the more revenue you can make. Yet, long hours contribute to a poor quality of life, resulting in little sleep and leisure time, as well as mental fatigue.
The same holds true for employees: working long hours comes at the expense of everything else, resulting in burnout – both mental and physical. The key to success for business owners and employees is finding a work life balance. Sometimes, it means literally moving to find it.
Fit Small Business, an online publication serving small owners, helped identify which states make work life balance a real possibility, not just a wish. The data can be found here.
Apparently, several Midwest states possess the magic ingredients to form the perfect recipe for work life balance – dramatically more so than other states. Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, North and South Dakota all made the Top 10 while in the Northeast, Vermont and Massachusetts also made the list. Also listed are the top cities within these states that offer the best work life balance.
The publication assembled publicly-available data from leading sources including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census Bureau and Gallup – and thoroughly analyzed it to determine the best states for work life balance.
Top 10 States and Cities for Work Life Balance:
#1 Minnesota (Eagan)
#2 Hawaii (Honolulu)
#3 Colorado (Boulder)
#4 Nebraska (Omaha)
#5 Vermont (Burlington)
#6 North Dakota (Fargo)
#7 Massachusetts (Cambridge)
#8 Iowa (Des Moines)
#9 Montana (Missoula)
#10 South Dakota (Sioux Falls)
Fit Small Business chose the following eight categories which significantly influence a state’s environment and how well it facilitates work life balance:
1) Residents’ assessment of the quality of life – 15 percent
2) Well-being index – 15 percent
3) Residents’ economic confidence – 15 percent
4) Average hours worked per week – 12.5 percent
5) Average earnings per week – 12.5 percent
6) Mean commute time to work – 12.5 percent
7) Cost of living – 10 percent
8) Percent of residents who feel active and productive – 7.5 percent
“Midwestern states dominate this list, and you can see those states ruling throughout the top 25 spots, offering their residents the best work life balance,” says Eric Noe, Editor-in-Chief, Fit Small Business. “While there are exceptions in the Top 10 such as Hawaii, Vermont and Massachusetts, the bottom half is mostly occupied by East Coast states, which should not come as much of a surprise to many people,” he adds.
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