Say it ain't so!

Slobs are us? Houston ranks sickeningly low on America's Fittest Cities list

fat couple trying to exercise with balls

The American Fitness Index measures various areas of well-being in our nation.

The American Fitness Index released its 2013 report on Wednesday, and while it's not terribly surprising that Houston has a poor showing — we did rank as Men's Fitness' 2012 Fattest City in America, after all — this ranking is perhaps worse.

Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown took No. 43 among United States cities in terms of the metropolitan statistical area's overall health and fitness, with a score of 38.3. While the Bayou City's areas of excellence included a high percentage of city land as parkland and a high acreage of parkland per capital, plus more strict state requirements for physical education classes, it could use improvement on nearly two dozen data points.

Those priority areas include: A low percentage of people eating five or more fruit and vegetable servings per day and a low percentage of people biking, walking or utilizing public transit to get to work, but a high percentage of smoking, obesity, diabetes, angina or coronary heart disease.

Plus, we have pitifully few park playgrounds, dog parks, golf courses, recreation centers, farmers markets, swimming pools and tennis courts per capita. And — get this — fewer primary heath care providers per capita than most other cities, even with the Texas Medical Center in our midst.

For the third consecutive year, Minneapolis ranked No. 1 on the American Fitness Index. Austin-Round Rock ranked No. 11 overall with a score of 63.6 on the AFI scale. Houston barely beat out Dallas, which ranked No. 44 with a score of 37.4, and San Antonio, which took No. 48 with a score of 35.1.

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income analysis

Texas families need to make this much money for one parent to stay home

Photo by CDC on Unsplash

With costs to raise a child soaring over $20,000 a year in Texas, some households might decide to have one parent work while the other stays at home to raise their child.

As the cost of raising a child balloons in major cities like Houston, many families are weighing the choice between paying for child care or having one parent stay home full-time.

A recent analysis from SmartAsset determined the minimum income one parent needs to earn to support their partner staying at home to raise one child in all 50 states. In Texas — not just Houston — that amount is just under $75,000.

The study used the MIT Living Wage Calculator to compare the annual living wages needed for a household with two working adults and one child, and a household with one working adult, a stay-at-home parent, and one child. The study also calculated how much it would cost to raise a child with two working parents based on factors such as "food, housing, childcare, healthcare, transportation, incremental income taxes and other necessities."

A Texas household with one working parent would need to earn $74,734 a year to support a stay-at-home partner and a child, the report found. If two parents worked in the household, necessitating some additional costs like childcare and transportation, it would require an additional $10,504 in annual income to raise their child.

SmartAsset said the cost to raise a child in Texas in a two-working-parent household adds up to $23,587. Raising a child in Houston, however, is somewhat more affordable. A separate SmartAsset study from June 2025 determined it costs $21,868 to raise a child in the Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands metro.

In the report's ranking of states with the highest minimum income needed to support a family with one working adult, a stay-at-home parent, and one child, Texas ranked 32nd on the list.

In other states like Massachusetts, where raising a child can cost more than $40,000 a year, the report acknowledges ways families are working to reduce any financial burdens.

"This often includes considerations around who’s going to work in the household, and whether young children will require paid daycare services while parents are occupied," the report said. "With tradeoffs abound, many parents might seek to understand the minimum income needed to keep the family afloat while allowing the other parent to stay home to raise a young child."

The top 10 states with the lowest minimum income threshold to support a three-person family on one income are:

West Virginia – $68,099
Arkansas – $68,141
Mississippi – $70,242
Kentucky – $70,408
North Dakota – $70,949
Oklahoma – $71,718
Ohio – $72,114
South Dakota – $72,218
Alabama – $72,238
Nebraska – $72,966

texas income smartasset family