Although all Americans are glad the government shutdown is over, some are happier than others. BuzzFeed’s Data Science Team used Facebook’s Keyword Insights API to find out who talked the most about the shutdown.
Obviously, everybody in and around D.C. was freaking out.
Virginia and Maryland came in first and second, respectively. It makes sense because of their close proximity to the capital and the large number of government-related jobs. The real surprises were Alaska at No. 4 and California at No. 45.
No surprise here: The younger you were, the less you cared about the shutdown.
Kids 13–17 accounted for just barely more than 1% of all mentions of the shutdown. A whopping 71% came from people between the ages of 18 and 44. That leaves the 45+ crowd with the remaining 27%.
The few young Americans who cared about the shutdown were primarily located on the West Coast.
This age group had the least participation from both Virginia and Maryland. Instead, kids in Washington, Arizona, Colorado, and Hawaii talked about the shutdown the most.
College-aged kids seemed to care at least a little bit.
The East Coast schools must have slipped this into the coursework, since Jersey, Virginia, New York, and Massachusetts took over. Apparently, Mainers were out catching lobster and missed the memo, but we'll let them off the hook.
