Here Are The Top 20 States With The Hardest Workers

The hardest workers in America put in long hours every day, but some states are more hard-working than others, a WalletHub study shows.

North Dakota took first place as the hardest-working state in 2019 while West Virginia secured the bottom spot as the least hard-working state, according to the study released Monday.

Alaska has the highest amount of average workweek hours in the U.S., while Hawaii has the highest employment rate and Minnesota has the lowest idle youth rate.

Meanwhile, Michigan has the lowest average workweek hours, Arizona has the lowest employment rate and Alabama has the highest idle youth rate, according to the study.

“Even when given the chance to not work as hard, many Americans won’t,” the study reads. “In fact, the average American only uses 54% of their available vacation time.”

Some Americans choose not to take vacation time out of fear of looking “less dedicated” than their co-workers, the study says, while other workers forgo vacation out of fear their absence will impact work productivity or make them fall behind.

The study compared the 50 states across two dimensions in order to find the hardest-working states: “Direct Work Factors” and “Indirect Work Factors.”

Direct work factors included average workweek hours, employment rate, share of households where no adults work, share of workers leaving vacation time unused, share of engaged workers, and idle youth. Indirect work factors included average commute time, share of workers with multiple jobs, annual volunteer hours per resident, and average leisure time spent per day.