Feeling miserable? You're not alone. L.A. County residents report decade-low quality of life
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A decade ago, Los Angeles County was facing serious economic and social challenges, but residents felt “generally lukewarm” about their quality of life.But lukewarm turned out to be L.A.’s high point.
As the years went on, Angelenos have continued to report falling satisfaction across key indicators — in particular, cost of living, traffic and education.This year, the county’s overall quality of life ranking dropped to the lowest point in one survey’s 11-year history.
This year’s record-low Quality of Life Index, a metric compiled by UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs, builds on a decline that accelerated rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic and has struggled to rebound, as L.A.County residents have faced several disasters and crises — destabilizing immigration raids and devastating wildfires — on top of some of the world’s highest housing costs.
“We’ve been through a lot in the last five years: COVID, increases in the cost of living, immigration sweeps, and the Altadena and Palisades fires.[They all] have taken their toll on virtually every aspect of our lives,” said Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, which conducts the poll.
“People haven’t had a chance to come out of the water and take a breath.”Cost of living remains the most important factor in determining residents’ quality of life, a measure that fell from 2025 rankings, the survey found.Respondents — a representative selection of 1,400 L.A.
County residents surveyed in March — said their cost of living outlook was most influenced by housing affordability, but the cost of utilities, groceries and taxes was increasingly mentioned this year.Almost all survey categories saw rankings decline compared to last year, with six categories hitting historic lows since the survey began in 2016: education, transportation/traffic, jobs and the economy,...