Hazard Risk Per Resident (By Metro)

Hazard Risk Per Resident — By Metro

The same FEMA data, ranked by expected annual loss per resident instead of the county total -- so a small county with real exposure isn't buried under a handful of huge ones. Shown alongside Social Vulnerability and Community Resilience: what actually separates a bad storm from a catastrophe.

A raw total rewards scale — a huge county racks up a bigger number partly because there's simply more there to lose, not because any one resident faces more danger. Dividing by population fixes that. But the dollar figure alone still isn't the whole story: Social Vulnerability and Community Resilience are what actually separate a bad storm from a catastrophe — Hurricane Katrina made landfall as "only" a strong Category 3, and it became the deadliest disaster in this dataset's memory because of who could evacuate and whether the levees held, not because the wind was unsurvivable. Money buys mobility — a car, a place to go, the ability to miss work — so Lack of Reliable Transportation (the share of adults without it) is shown alongside as the closest available read on who actually can't leave. A high resilience score today can reflect real rebuilding since a past disaster, not a claim that the disaster didn't happen.

A small county landing near the top of this list isn't a math artifact to wave away — it's a different kind of signal than a big county in the same spot. The same dollar total that would barely register against Los Angeles's economy can be a meaningful share of a small county's whole tax base, workforce, or population. A high per-resident number in a small place isn't necessarily "this individual is in more danger" — it's closer to "one bad year could reshape this place's economy or its culture," which a huge, diverse county can absorb in a way a small one can't. Population is shown for every row so you can read the number in that context, not to discount it.

52 metros ranked, highest expected loss per resident first

#	Metro	Expected Loss / Resident / Yr	Population	Counties	Social Vulnerability	Community Resilience	Lacks Transportation
1	Alaska	$1,282	733,971	30	27.2	26.3	9.3%
2	Silicon Valley	$929	9,101,124	13	28.2	73.9	8.1%
3	Monterey	$923	435,834	1	54.8	24.7	11.5%
4	New Orleans	$874	988,763	7	68.1	98.7	11.7%
5	Baton Rouge	$754	871,379	10	56.6	62.9	10.9%
6	Hawaii	$744	1,445,635	5	31.8	65.6	8.1%
7	Greater Los Angeles	$732	13,012,469	2	48.0	14.2	9.7%
8	California	$731	11,222,760	40	44.3	35.0	10.4%
9	Greater St. Louis	$714	2,809,414	15	29.9	79.1	8.1%
10	Montana	$696	923,187	49	34.0	56.8	8.4%
11	Iowa	$692	1,961,498	88	28.2	82.5	7.5%
12	Bozeman & Greater Yellowstone	$687	402,767	14	17.6	69.4	7.4%
13	Nebraska	$680	1,965,926	93	19.5	72.2	7.0%
14	Missouri	$675	2,743,854	99	39.5	53.4	9.4%
15	Louisiana	$662	2,760,883	47	68.1	62.0	12.2%
16	Minnesota	$623	1,994,110	73	32.4	89.1	8.1%
17	Arkansas	$622	2,469,215	72	64.5	43.0	10.7%
18	Illinois	$621	2,871,607	80	43.4	81.0	8.6%
19	Mississippi	$555	2,951,438	82	68.7	52.9	12.5%
20	Kentucky	$547	4,061,369	114	52.5	57.9	—
21	Lehigh Valley (Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton)	$519	110,238	1	12.2	79.2	6.9%
22	Florida	$506	9,828,514	56	52.4	40.3	—
23	Alabama	$496	5,054,253	67	58.7	59.8	10.3%
24	the Sun Belt — Arizona	$495	7,268,175	15	40.5	16.9	9.2%
25	the Cedar Rapids-Iowa City Corridor	$488	453,380	5	14.9	96.3	6.8%
26	Colorado	$483	1,801,100	51	25.8	48.1	—
27	Greater San Diego	$469	3,282,782	1	24.8	8.3	8.3%
28	Greater Chicago	$447	9,359,555	13	42.6	75.5	8.4%
29	New Mexico	$444	1,360,601	18	57.2	24.5	11.8%
30	Nevada	$437	3,141,000	17	41.9	12.6	10.4%
31	Northwest Arkansas	$414	563,436	3	23.5	39.0	8.2%
32	Kansas City	$413	2,202,006	14	21.5	65.7	7.8%
33	Idaho (Boise)	$383	1,672,414	37	22.1	52.8	7.7%
34	Boulder	$382	328,317	1	11.4	91.2	—
35	Georgia	$370	4,347,510	129	52.3	40.6	11.1%
36	Ames	$366	98,592	1	12.9	86.8	6.8%
37	the Twin Cities	$350	3,556,181	13	16.7	96.3	7.1%
38	Cincinnati	$337	529,106	9	15.7	69.1	6.7%
39	New York City	$334	6,892,890	12	47.4	61.8	7.7%
40	Tampa Bay	$326	3,240,469	4	45.2	20.8	—
41	Greater Miami / South Florida	$324	6,138,876	3	65.4	38.8	—
42	Des Moines	$323	682,467	5	16.3	92.1	6.7%
43	New England (NH · VT · ME · RI · CT)	$318	2,765,234	26	21.7	79.5	7.3%
44	Indianapolis	$317	2,128,089	11	27.5	69.4	7.7%
45	Denver	$315	2,977,085	10	14.5	60.8	—
46	Philadelphia	$315	2,035,141	6	30.2	80.7	7.9%
47	Michigan	$300	5,315,581	76	38.0	86.3	8.5%
48	Greater Orlando	$282	2,721,022	4	31.2	44.6	—
49	Detroit	$266	4,367,620	6	43.4	75.4	9.3%
50	Greater Atlanta	$236	6,176,937	29	21.5	41.0	8.9%
51	New England	$201	4,468,755	5	27.9	93.4	7.6%
52	the DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia)	$196	3,134,300	5	32.1	62.3	8.1%