Ballotpedia:Who Runs the States, New Hampshire
The two major political parties claim that their policies will lead to better outcomes. What does the data show?
At Ballotpedia, we explored these issues in a three-part study, Who Runs the States.
This page takes a specific look at how New Hampshire performed in the study.
Background about the study
- See also: Ballotpedia: Who Runs the States
Part One examines the partisanship of state government from 1992-2013. Part Two establishes a State Quality of Life Index (SQLI), aggregating a variety of existing state indices into one measurement. Part Three will overlay the two reports, looking for trends and correlations.
Part 1: Partisanship analysis
New Hampshire Governor
From 1992 to 2013, there were Democratic governors in office for 15 years, including the last nine, while there were Republican governors in office for seven years.
Across the country, there were 493 years of Democratic governors (44.82%) and 586 years of Republican governors (53.27%) from 1992-2013.
Over the course of the 22-year study, state governments became increasingly more partisan. At the outset of the study period (1992), 18 of the 49 states with partisan legislatures had single-party trifectas and 31 states had divided governments. In 2013, only 13 states have divided governments, while single-party trifectas held sway in 36 states, the most in the 22 years studied.
New Hampshire Senate
From 1992 to 2013, the Democratic Party was the majority in the New Hampshire State Senate for six years while the Republicans were the majority for 16 years. The New Hampshire senate had a Republican majority for the study's final three years.
Across the country, there were 541 Democratic and 517 Republican state senates from 1992 to 2013.
New Hampshire House of Representatives
From 1992-2013, the Democratic Party was the majority in the New Hampshire State House of Representatives for five years while the Republicans were the majority for 17 years.
Across the country, there were 579 Democratic and 482 Republican State Houses of Representatives from 1992 to 2013.
Partisan control changes
There were eight partisan control changes in New Hampshire during the study period. The average number of changes in the 50 states was four, putting New Hampshire higher than the average.
Part 2: State Quality of Life Index (SQLI)
New Hampshire’s average ranking over the course of the study period was 2.00, which puts it at 1 in the overall SQLI ranking.
- The years that New Hampshire had the highest ranking were 1994-1996, 1998-2005, and 2008, in which it ranked 1st.
- The year that New Hampshire had the lowest ranking was 2012, in which it ranked 7th.
- The index type that New Hampshire had the highest ranking in was Poverty Rate, in which it ranked 1st.
- The index type that New Hampshire had the lowest ranking in was Unfunded Pension Liabilities Per Capita, in which it ranked 33rd.
|New Hampshire SQLI 1992-2012|
|24/7 Wall St Best/Worst Governed States||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||8||13||14|
|America's Health Rankings||8||4||5||2||3||4||4||4||3||3||3||3||3||6||5||6||6||5||3||2||3|
|Chief Executive Magazine Best and Worst States for Business Survey||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||15||15||15||14||18||18||18||26|
|CNBC Top States for Business||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||24||27||21||19||17||19|
|Forbes Best States for Business||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||18||14||20||19||19||27||32|
|Govt. Employment Share Population||7||8||11||6||8||8||8||8||6||6||9||13||11||14||13||14||16||16||17||15||17|
|Personal Income Per Capita||12||13||10||10||7||7||7||6||6||7||6||6||6||10||10||9||9||9||8||9||9|
|Real GDP per capita||20||20||23||20||17||27||23||21||19||20||19||21||20||20||22||23||22||23||21||20||N/A|
|S&P Credit Rating||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||11||11||20||18||17||20||21||24||26||26||28||29|
|State Govt. Spending/GDP||17||14||18||9||9||7||6||6||10||7||9||15||14||13||11||12||14||11||14||11||N/A|
|State & local tax burden||20||18||8||8||8||7||7||7||7||6||6||6||5||7||6||5||6||7||7||N/A||N/A|
|Tax Freedom Day||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||31|
|Unfunded Pension Liabilities per capita||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A||37||30||30||N/A|
- Ballotpedia:Who runs the states
- Governor of New Hampshire
- New Hampshire State Senate
- New Hampshire House of Representatives
- Note: The average rank is compiled by adding up all years of rankings and then dividing by 21 to obtain the average state ranking. This average figure is ranked relative to the rest of the 49 states to derive an overall SQLI ranking.
State of New Hampshire
|State executive officers||
Governor | Attorney General | Secretary of State | Treasurer | Commissioner of Education | Commissioner of Insurance | Commissioner of Agriculture | Executive Director of Fish and Game | Commissioner of Labor | Chairman of Public Utilities |