Mississippi produces more food per person than the UK, and while Mississippians earn about the same on average as Britons, they live in homes more than twice the size and are more likely to own a car, a gun, or a swimming pool.

Recently, a British conservative commentator was exasperated by how poorly the liberal British government has managed the country. He stated that, according to recent data, the UK was poorer than every U.S. state. An in-depth analysis confirms that, despite being one of the richest countries in Europe, the UK is not only poorer than the United States but also poorer than Mississippi, the poorest state in the U.S.

The first measure of national wealth is nominal GDP. U.S. nominal GDP exceeds $32 trillion, compared to the UK’s $4.6 trillion. The U.S. population, of course, is much larger, at about 340 million, while the population of the UK is approximately 69.3 million.

To compensate for differences in population size, economists use GDP per capita. In 2026, U.S. GDP per capita is nearly $95,000, while in the UK it is only about $53,000.

Across measures of economic scale, income, wealth, housing, transportation, infrastructure, and employment, the U.S. numbers compared to the UK’s were almost laughable. As a result, it seemed logical to compare the UK to the largest U.S. state, California, whose population of just over 39 million is about 43% smaller than the UK’s.

Other than having a larger population, the UK performed even more poorly against California on most metrics. For example, California’s GDP per capita is $104,795.

To be fair, California is America’s richest state. To avoid making the comparison a complete blowout, it made sense to move down the rankings and compare the UK to America’s poorest state, Mississippi.

The unemployment rate among Mississippi’s 2.95 million inhabitants is only about 3.6% to 3.9%, whereas in the UK it is 5%. Mississippi’s per capita personal income is about $54,000, marginally higher than that of the UK. Taxes are also lower in Mississippi. The state’s sales tax is 7%, while the UK’s Value Added Tax (VAT) is 20%. Consequently, people in Mississippi tend to own more consumer goods.

Car ownership figures are not even close. There are approximately 757 to 809 vehicles per 1,000 people in Mississippi, compared to only 603 per 1,000 in the UK.

Homes are also much larger in Mississippi, averaging 1,870 to 1,950 square feet (174 to 181 square meters). Most Mississippians live in a freestanding home with a yard, while many people in the UK live in apartments or row houses with, at best, a small garden. The average home size in the UK is only about 818 to 900 square feet (76 to 85 square meters).

Driving all of those cars is a lot cheaper in Mississippi, where the average cost of a gallon of gasoline is $3.89 despite the U.S.-Iran conflict. In the UK, by contrast, motorists are paying about $9.66 per gallon (158.5 pence per liter).

Europeans are fond of portraying Americans, particularly those from the South, as uneducated. However, there are more tertiary educational institutions per capita in Mississippi than in the UK. The UK has 130 higher-education institutions, while Mississippi has only 23. This gives Mississippi one higher-education institution for about every 128,000 residents, compared to one for about every 533,000 residents in the UK.

If you live in Mississippi, you are also more likely to have a swimming pool. The UK has only about 250,000 private swimming pools, while roughly one in six Mississippi residents has access to a private swimming pool.

Europeans are fond of saying that the U.S. has terrible infrastructure, but a fair comparison shows that the United States has more than twice as many miles of highway, more than twice as many miles of freight rail, and roughly ten times as many airports as the entire European Union. The exact numbers can be found in this author’s Gateway Pundit article, “High-Speed Rail in USA: An Expensive Tax Burden and Inefficient Solution for America’s Travel Infrastructure.”

However, this comparison is limited to Mississippi and the UK. Mississippi has approximately 73,000 miles of highway, while the UK has about 243,000 miles. Despite having a population roughly 23 times larger than Mississippi’s, the UK has only 3.3 times as many miles of highway.

The UK has more miles of freight rail than Mississippi, with 9,848 miles (15,849 km) compared to 3,571 miles, but just like with highway mileage, when this is compared to the population, Mississippi has more than one mile per 826 people, whereas the UK has one mile per 7,036 people.

When it comes to air travel, Mississippi wins on sheer numbers and shoots off the charts when per capita measures are considered. There are 80 public-use airports in Mississippi. Counting both public and private facilities, the number rises to 246. The UK has approximately 35 to 40 public airports and about 41 private airports. Under the broadest definitions of an airport, some sources claim the UK has more than 200, but that is still below the Mississippi figure.

One reason for the large number of airports in Mississippi is the quantity of aircraft. There are about 0.8 aircraft per thousand people in Mississippi, compared to only 0.32 in the UK.

In addition to measuring wealth by money, it is also useful to look at the everyday quality of life. Mississippi is known for its obesity, a byproduct of food being cheaper and more plentiful. Total agricultural output in the UK is $51 billion. In Mississippi, it is $9.51 billion. This means that Mississippi produces about 4.4 times as much food per person as the UK.

Apart from bigger homes, more trucks, and more food, two categories that are important to a lot of Americans are religion and gun ownership. There are an estimated 5,500 to 9,200 churches in Mississippi and about 40,000 in the UK. This gives Mississippi approximately one church for every 321 to 536 residents, compared to one church for about every 1,733 residents in the UK. There are also 12 to 15 mosques in Mississippi and 1,500 to 2,000 in the UK.

Mississippi wins hands down in firearms. There are an estimated 1.5 million to 2.2 million guns in Mississippi, or nearly 1 gun per adult, compared to approximately 2 million legally owned firearms and shotguns in the UK, or about 0.029 guns per person.

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