| In a report done by personal finance website Wallethub, each U.S. state was put on a ranking system from safest to most dangerous, with placing West Virginia at 32.
One being the safest, 50 being the least safe.
The state ranks 43rd with bullying.
To determine where states fell on the list, Wallethub used five fields of criteria: personal and residential safety, financial safety, road safety, workplace safety and emergency preparedness. The criteria also had 53 key metrics in total spread out between them such as thefts per capita under personal and residential safety and fatal occupational injuries per 100,000 under workplace safety.
What factored into West Virginiaâs ranking is being placed 47th in high unemployment (tied with New Mexico) and most fatal occupational injuries per total workers, 48th in lowest percentage of adults with rainy day funds and 43rd in highest bullying incidence rate. However, factors like the state placing 18th in personal and residential safety and 20th in emergency preparedness improved the stateâs overall positioning.
Compared to neighboring states, West Virginia outranked Pennsylvania (33) and Ohio (35.) Maryland, Kentucky and Virginia ranked higher at 24, 16 and 15 respectively.
The report lists Maine as being the safest state followed by Vermont in second, Minnesota in third, Utah in fourth and Wyoming in fifth. In contrast, the least safe state was Mississippi placing at 50 with Louisiana, Florida, Arkansas and Texas trailing behind in that order.
Statistics point to Maine having a low number of assaults and hate groups making the state safer. For Mississippi, some factors making it the least safe state in the country is the lowest rating of 50 for both emergency preparedness and road safety.
Other information the report concludes is South Dakota has the least amount of murders and non-negligent manslaughters per 100,000 residents (1.36), New Hampshire has the fewest cases of larceny per 1,000 residents (12.75), New Jersey has the most law enforcement employees per 100,000 residents (473) and Delaware had the lowest amount of high school students who were bullied online (10.10 percent.)
| 
