If you’re looking for a home where you can spread out, the densely settled Boston area can be tough. But Easton, 30 miles south of the city, has done a better job than most towns of preserving its open spaces. The town also features many family-friendly amenities, including the Children’s Museum and the Ames Free Library downtown (which was named one of the best small libraries in America in 2011 by the Library Journal). --N.D.
(I) Income tax notes:
17 states have statutory provisions for automatically adjusting to the rate of inflation the dollar values of the income tax brackets, standard deductions, and/or personal exemptions. Massachusetts, Michigan, and Nebraska index the personal exemption only. Oregon does not index the income brackets for $125,000 and over. Because the inflation-adjustments for 2011 are not yet available in most cases, the table reports the 2010 amounts, unless 2011 is specified in a footnote.
Using statistics from data services company Onboard Informatics, we crunched the numbers in order to zero in on America's best small towns for families. (Last year, we looked at small cities, with populations between 50,000 and 300,000.)
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