Rank

1539of 3,144

Rhea, Tennessee

Score 6.30 / 10· population 33,924

Rhea County lies along Watts Bar Lake, a TVA reservoir on the Tennessee River, 35 to 45 miles north of Chattanooga, and its largest employer in 2025 was La-Z-Boy, with about 1,450 workers. Official 2024 returns put Trump 67 points ahead of Harris here, 83 percent to 16. Smokers were 24 percent of Rhea adults in 2022, five points over the state rate, and life expectancy for 2020-2022 stood 2.1 years short of Tennessee's, at 71.4.

Sources
  • Watts Bar Lake is a TVA reservoir on the Tennessee River that extends across portions of Roane, Meigs, and Rhea counties; Rhea County is approximately 35 to 45 miles north of Chattanooga wallacetn.com
  • La-Z-Boy is Rhea County's largest employer, with approximately 1,450 employees (article dated August 23, 2025) chattanoogan.com
  • Tennessee Secretary of State official results, November 5, 2024 general election, Rhea County president: Trump 11,974 (82.9%), Harris 2,312 (16.0%), five other candidates 158, for 14,444 votes in all; Trump led by 66.9 points sos-prod.tnsosgovfiles.com
  • County Health Rankings 2025: Rhea County life expectancy 71.42 years, Tennessee 73.51 (a gap of 2.1 years); adult smoking 24.4% in Rhea County, 19.2% in Tennessee (a gap of 5.2 points) countyhealthrankings.org
  • In County Health Rankings 2025, Life Expectancy uses 2020-2022 NCHS mortality data and Adult Smoking uses 2022 BRFSS data 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 President8.3
  4. Sales tax1.1
  5. Property tax7.4

Environment

  1. Air quality5.8
  2. Floods / hurricanes3.7

Private behavior

  1. Homicide rate7.8
  2. Life expectancy1.4
  3. Government employees4.1
  4. Single-parent households2.7

Neighbors