Rank

2427of 3,144

Lauderdale, Tennessee

Score 5.63 / 10· population 24,610

Lauderdale County sits on the Mississippi between the Forked Deer and Hatchie rivers, with bottomland in the west and a Marvin Windows plant among the largest employers in Ripley, the seat. Alex Haley spent his boyhood in Henning and is buried in his grandparents' front yard there. Single parents headed 47% of households with children in 2020-2024, homicides ran 12.9 per 100,000 in 2016-2022 (Tennessee: 9.6), and life expectancy in 2020-2022 was 70.7 years, under the state's 73.5.

Sources
  • Lauderdale County is bounded by the Forked Deer River, the Mississippi River and the Hatchie River; its western portion is in the Mississippi Bottom and its eastern part on the Gulf Coastal Plain; Ripley has been the county seat since 1836 tennesseeencyclopedia.net
  • Alex Haley lived in his grandparents' (Will and Cynthia Palmer's) house in Henning from 1921 to 1929, and after his death in 1992 was buried in its front yard tennesseeencyclopedia.net
  • Ripley is the county seat; Marvin Windows of Tennessee, Inc. (Ripley) is among the county's top employers, second only to the school district on the list tnecd.com
  • Single-parent households with children were 47.3% of households with children in Lauderdale County (5-year estimate ending 2024, i.e. 2020-2024) fred.stlouisfed.org
  • County Health Rankings 2025: homicides 12.9 per 100,000 in Lauderdale County, 9.6 in Tennessee countyhealthrankings.org
  • County Health Rankings 2025: life expectancy 70.7 years in Lauderdale County, 73.5 in Tennessee countyhealthrankings.org
  • County Health Rankings 2025 data years: Homicides 2016-2022; Life Expectancy 2020-2022 (NCHS mortality files) countyhealthrankings.org

v4 — beta, 30 October 2026, sourced values

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Eleven factors

Government behavior

  1. Fraser Institute state ranking (state)8.3
  2. 2A (state)10.0
  3. GOP + LP vote for President6.8
  4. Sales tax1.1
  5. Property tax6.7

Environment

  1. Air quality5.7
  2. Floods / hurricanes5.0

Private behavior

  1. Homicide rate2.8
  2. Life expectancy0.4
  3. Government employees6.9
  4. Single-parent households1.1

Neighbors