'Sad,' 'miserable,' 'uneducated': Do lists pick on Beaumont?

Keep clicking to see where Beaumont ranks on state, national lists. less The Beaumont-Port Arthur metro area has landed on lists such as the most miserable city to live in, the worst city for singles and more — but some argue that these lists do little to change the public's perception of the area. The Beaumont-Port Arthur metro area has landed on lists such as the most miserable city to live in, the worst city for singles and more — but some argue that these lists do little to change the public's ... more Photo: Guiseppe Barranco, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Photo: Guiseppe Barranco, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Image 1 of / 27 Caption Close 'Sad,' 'miserable,' 'uneducated': Do lists pick on Beaumont? 1 / 27 Back to Gallery

Sad, miserable, uneducated, unsafe for women: That's Beaumont, if you believe the lists and surveys the city seems to make with depressing regularity.

The lists, frequently compiled by personal finance or "infotainment" sites, categorize and rank cities in Texas and nationally, generally using selected - often selective - data from reputable sources in a way that might or might not be statistically kosher.

While some of the rankings - you're probably miserable unless you're a plumber or a pipefitter - might come down to a matter of opinion, judging their validity requires looking closely at what exactly they aim to measure.

Personal finance website ValuePenguin.com recently ranked Beaumont-Port Arthur as one of the worst areas for single people.

Nola Knowles of Lumberton takes issue with the New York-based firm's ranking, and all of those done by people who've never been to Beaumont. There are plenty of options for single people around here, she said.

"Imagine, someone who has never been here, never lived here, pulling statistics from unknown databases, social media or even the most recent U.S. Census and drawing an inference, a conclusion," said Knowles, 53.

That's exactly what ValuePenguin does, according to spokesman Andrew Pentis. He said his organization looked at data sets like the number of men and women who have never married as well as more subjective factors like the number of bars, restaurants, museums, golf courses and salons in the area, mostly from U.S. Census data.

The inclusion of Beaumont - a relatively small city with a population of just over 117,000 - on so many lists might seem curious. But sites often limit their consideration to the top 200 "metropolitan statistical areas," which increases the odds of being pinpointed.

>> See the rankings that Beaumont has appeared on in the slideshow above

The Southeast Texas MSA includes Jefferson, Hardin, Newton and Orange counties, whose total population is just over 400,000, making it the 130th-largest MSA in the country, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Beaumont is among the 30 largest Texas cities by population, which accounts for its place on many of the statewide rankings.

From there, how sites crunch the data determines just how miserable we are.

Fuzzy math

Pentis said that when ValuePenguin started doing these studies about a year ago, it found that people were paying more attention to them than to their reviews of things like credit cards. He said they have released 12 studies, with plans to do more.

"We're amping this up because people like them, people interact with them, people critique them," Pentis said. The site also named the area among the least safe for women, least safe overall, worst for biking and best for plumbers and pipefitters.

Personal finance website WalletHub.com uses a similar process to produce two to three studies each week, said analyst Jill Gonzalez. She said the company consults with academic experts on topics to determine what data sets to consider and how to weigh them.

Many of WalletHub's studies are intended for families and individuals who are making decisions like relocating to a new town, Gonzalez said.

Apparently, they don't recommend Beaumont for either. The city was rated second-to-last on WalletHub's list of "best cities for Texas families" and near the bottom of "least educated cities in the U.S."

Other sites, like RoadSnacks.net, decide what lists to write and which data to measure based on what they think will go viral.

The site, which publishes dozens of lists about each state, named Port Arthur the 13th-most miserable place in Texas and the second-worst place to live in the state. Both Beaumont and Port Arthur made the site's "10 most ghetto cities in Texas" list.

RoadSnacks co-founder Nick James said the site started out writing positive "best" lists but now focuses on negative lists because those can "become viral sensations."

The "most ghetto" cities list was viewed more than 200,000 times.

The rankings are determined by an algorithm the site has developed that "scrapes the internet" for public information, James said.

Common denominators

Darrielle Kyles, 28, who moved to Beaumont from Houston, said her friends have noticed Beaumont's snake-bitten status in the lists.

"When you talk to people who aren't from here, they'll tease me and say, 'You're in a city that's the most depressing or has the most crime,'" she said.

Beaumont is included on so many "worst" lists partly because many of those surveys use similar data sets like crime, poverty and unemployment rates to determine their ratings.

Beaumont, which earns low rankings in many of these categories relative to other cities, tends to score similarly across surveys that measure those, no matter the specific topic or who's writing them.

At least eight recent studies factored in unemployment rates in their analyses. The Beaumont-Port Arthur area's unemployment rate is 7.5 percent, one of the highest in the nation and well above the national average of 5 percent.

It's the same story with median household income rates, a data set at least five recent surveys used. According to U.S. Census data, Beaumont's median income level in 2014 was just over $39,000, and Port Arthur's was just under $32,000. Both were well below the national average of $53,482.

On more subjective measures, Beaumont gets hit hard by rankings too, like the weather. While a firm in New York might call a rainy, 90-degree day miserable, locals don't seem upset by it. The list-makers are oblivious to that.

Steve Murdock, former Texas state demographer and director of the U.S. Census Bureau, said the region's economy and demographics make it hard to compare to other Texas cities.

"The main thing that you've had in Beaumont is you've had quite high poverty, moderate levels of education, high levels of diversity. ... The composition differs, the economic base varies," he said. For that reason, ranking Beaumont among non-industrial cities can be like comparing apples and aardvarks.

What really matters

Lists have become popular in recent years because they're easily shareable on social media, especially Facebook. While some sites, like ValuePenguin, are just getting into the game, others, like RoadSnacks, have been compiling them for years.

But because of changes in trends and in the way Facebook boosts certain types of content, RoadSnacks' James thinks "it's a trend that's going to die."

What people should be paying attention to when they look at the lists is the type of data selected and how it is used, Murdock said.

"There are so many things to control for that you can never get an absolutely perfect comparison," he said.

However, if you look at the statistics used to compile the lists and the variables are accurate and relevant, "it's probably something to look at," he said.

In fact, the studies can draw vastly different conclusions, Murdock said. For example, areas that rank poorly in terms of income level or poverty rates, like Beaumont-Port Arthur, might also rank high on affordability, he said.

On WalletHub's list of "worst cities for Texas families," low income hurt Beaumont's ranking, but the city also earned the top spot on a CareerBuilder ranking of the best places to earn a living wage.

Regina Lindsey, president of the Greater Beaumont Chamber of Commerce, said her organization considers who compiles the list before deciding whether or not to take it seriously.

"An entity like Forbes that really understands businesses, we will pay attention to those lists," she said. "Some of them are valid to take a look at in terms of positioning ourselves and areas we need to address."

"I think a lot of them are tongue-in-cheek, take them with a grain of salt," said Mike Kunst, city manager in Vidor, which recently topped RoadSnacks' list of "10 Most Redneck Cities in Texas." "They're fun to read when you're bored, but you have to look at the methodology."

Publicity for whom?

Ray Perryman, an economist with the Perryman Group in Waco, said these studies get a lot of attention because the organizations behind them are media-savvy. He said the rankings are unlikely to have any effect on corporations looking to move to an area; they use more sophisticated analysis processes.

Lindsey said that how locals interpret the results of these non-scientific studies often depends on how they already feel about the area.

"They'll latch onto whatever list matches their mindset," she said,

Whether you already think Southeast Texas is the best place to do business or the most miserable place in America, what someone in New York or North Carolina has to say isn't likely to sway you.

Most of us are like Bill McCoy, president of Port Arthur's Chamber of Commerce:

"When they're good, we point them out. When they're bad, we just say, 'They don't know what they're talking about.' "

NKrebs@BeaumontEnterprise.com Twitter.com/natalie_krebs

LTeitz@BeaumontEnterprise.com Twitter.com/lizteitz