County Distress Index
The County Distress Index (CDI) scores all 3,144 U.S. counties on a 0–100 scale across five domains: debt and delinquency, income and poverty, housing cost burden, employment and wages, and community vulnerability. A score of 50 is the national median. Higher means more distressed.
Data: Census, BLS, Urban Institute, HUD, US Courts
National Snapshot
3,144 counties scored across five domains. Click any zone to see the full list.
County Distress Map
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All 3,144 counties colored by distress zone. Hover for details; click any county for full report.
Score Distribution
How 3,144 county distress scores are distributed across the 0–100 scale. The median county scores 50.1.
All Counties
| Rank | County | State | Score | Zone |
|---|
Browse by State
Select a state to see county-level distress data, rankings, and maps.
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
District of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
How County Scores Work
Each county is scored 0–100 using PCA-weighted percentile-rank scoring across five statistically derived dimensions: Consumer Credit Distress, Housing Cost Burden, Structural Poverty, Economic Vitality, and Legal Distress. A score of 50 means the county falls at the national median. Higher scores indicate greater household financial distress.
Frequently Asked Questions
What data sources are used for county distress scores?
County scores draw from 14 federal and nonprofit data sources: the Urban Institute and FRED/Equifax (debt delinquency, subprime credit), Bureau of Labor Statistics (unemployment, wages), Census Bureau (poverty, housing burden, business formation), HUD (fair market rents), Bureau of Economic Analysis (transfer income), FHFA (house prices), and U.S. Courts (bankruptcy filings). Each county is scored across 21 individual indicators grouped into five statistically derived dimensions.
How often are county scores updated?
County data is updated as new source data becomes available — typically monthly for employment and wages, annually for Census poverty and housing data. The composite scores are recomputed after each data update. New county detail pages are published weekly.
How do county scores differ from the national American Distress Index?
The national ADI tracks household financial distress over time using quarterly time-series data. County scores are cross-sectional — they compare counties to each other at a point in time using percentile-rank averaging. Both use a 0–100 scale with the same zone thresholds, but they measure different things: the ADI tracks trends, county scores compare places.