This is the ‘happiest’ county in California, study says

The new California Assembly Select Committee on Happiness and Public Policy recently released its first report, which sought to discover which California county was the happiest.

The report, meant to guide legislators in crafting future laws, includes survey data from organizations, including the Public Policy Institute of California.

Researchers found Alpine County, one of the state’s least populous counties just south of Lake Tahoe, was the “happiest.” Marin, Placer, Yolo and San Luis Obispo counties rounded out the top five.

Los Angeles County, the state’s most populous, ranked 29 ^th “happiest” county. Orange County was eighth, Santa Barbara County was seventh, Riverside County was 32 ^nd and San Bernardino County was 42 ^nd .

Overall, researchers found that location, employment, leisure, housing and other factors correlated to happiness.

“Responses indicate that while the number of “pretty happy” Californians has remained relatively stable over the past 25 years, the percentage of “very happy” Californians has shrunk substantially, from 28% in 1998 to 16% in 2023. Meanwhile, the percentage of ‘not too happy’ Californians has doubled,” the report said.

The report noted that lawmakers considering new legislation should consider the potential impact on happiness in their decisions and include that possibility in legislative discussions.

It noted that the city of Santa Monica used well-being data to inform its community plan in 2017. Fremont, often recognized as the happiest city in the U.S ., also leveraged happiness data to guide policy.

The full report can be viewed here.

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