Part of our deep dive on this information included finding which state had the highest and lowest unemployment rate in the country in every year evaluated. To simplify that data and its presentation, we made a map for every decade since the 1980s and highlighted every state that had the highest unemployment at least once in that time in red, and every state with the lowest rate at least once in green. We also listed the highest and lowest for each year in the tables below the maps and included the specific rates for each.




Reviewing the data this way reveals a couple of common themes. Namely, Plains states, such as Nebraska and the Dakotas, consistently have some of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, as does Hawaii. On the flip side, less populous states such as West Virginia and Alaska show up time and again with some of America’s highest unemployment rates, as do Washington, D.C. and Michigan.