In a recent analysis of the Best & Worst States to Raise a Family by personal-finance website WalletHub, Massachusetts ranked No. 6 overall and earned particularly high marks in four out of five categories, including “family fun,” “health and safety,” “education and child care,” and “affordability,” making the state an attractive home for parents with young children.
Even in “socio-economics,” the final category, it outranked 28 states. Education and technology are unsurprisingly Massachusetts’ biggest industries, considering the state is the No. 1 most educated and third most innovative. Parents with high family standards therefore have little to sacrifice — and much to gain — by relocating to the Bay State.
With high family standards in mind, WalletHub released its report identifying 2017’s Best Places to Live in Massachusetts for Families. The website’s analysts compared 86 cities in the state to determine the most suitable places in which to put down roots. The analysis was carried out using 21 key indicators of family-friendliness, ranging from median family income to school-system quality to housing affordability.
Below are the top 20 Massachusetts cities for raising a family. Several North Shore cities, including Newburyport, Lynnfileld, and Woburn, made the list.
1. Longmeadow
2. Franklin Town
3. Winchester
4. Lexington
5. Wellesly
6. Needham
7. Belmont
8. Reading
9. Milton
10. Newton
11. Arlington
12. Melrose
13. Marblehead
14. Wilmington
15. Lynnfield
16. Maynard
17. Norwood
18. Newburyport
19. Swampscott
20. Woburn
Lynnfield, at No. 15, has the lowest separation and divorce rate at 8.03 percent, which is 4.2 times lower than in North Adams, the city with the highest at 33.37 percent.
To view the full report and your city’s rank, click here.