Is Dauphin County the most average county in the country?

Dauphin County is known for many things, especially housing the state capital, Harrisburg, and all that comes along with it.

But that’s not all. According to Echelon Insights’ recently released Middle America Project, Dauphin County was just named the most typical county in the U.S. The report found that the county is most statistically likely to resemble America as a whole. The report analyzed more than 3,000 counties and considered each one’s politics, economics, generations and racial, religious and educational makeup. And Dauphin County, with a population of 271,962, is the most statistically average of all.

In education, 29.3 percent of residents over 25 in the county have a college degree, just 1 percent below the national average of 30.3 percent. Financially, the median income is $54,968, less than $3,000 below the national average of $57,805. The median age is 39.6 in the county, which is slightly above the nationwide average. Nearly half of residents (47.8 percent) belong to a religious organization, compared to 48.8 percent across the country. In the 2016 presidential election, the county voted for Hilary Clinton by 2.9 points, compared to the nationwide average of 2.1 points.

Not to be deterred, Dauphin County’s nearby neighbor, Lehigh County, was named the second most average county in the country. Scoring just nine points below Dauphin, Leigh’s “averageness” is very similar. Like Dauphin County, Lehigh voted for Clinton in 2016, but by a margin of 4.74 percent. The average income is $57,685, nearly identical to the national average, and 28.9 percent over 25 are college grads. The median age is 39.5 and the population is larger than Dauphin County’s, at 358,792.

Dauphin and Lehigh counties were the only Pennsylvania areas to make the top 25.