We know government finances can be depressing, but there are still a lot of things to be happy about. We used Data-Z to pick eight cities and states to be our valentines. Data-Z is an online database by Truth in Accounting (TIA) with over 700 data variables on the federal, state, and city levels. We picked our valentines based on their ranking on a variety of data series, including demographic, economic, and financial data.

Here are our eight valentines:

1. To Irvine for being the No. 1 city in our Financial State of the Cities for three years in a row. Irvine has $380 million available to pay future bills
2. To Alaska for having a Taxpayer Surplus of $74,200. This means that Alaska could divide the $19.7 billion the state has available to pay future bills and give each taxpayer $74,200.
3. To New Hampshire for having the lowest murder rate per 100,000. New Hampshire's murder rate is one per every 100,000 people.
4. To Idaho for having $1.5 billion available for future bills. When divided by the number of taxpayers, Idaho has a Taxpayer Surplus of $2,900.
5. To Detroit for funding their retiree health care benefits more than 100 percent.
6. To Utah for having the lowest percentage of children in poverty at 9.51 percent. This is 44 percent less than the 50 state average.
7. To South Dakota for being the only state to fully fund their pensions. Even though other states have the money available, they have not set it aside for pensions.
8. To Washington D.C. for overfunding their pensions by $610,000 and their retiree health care by $71,000.

Now that you have seen our top eight Valentines, you can use Data-Z to choose yours.

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