Directly equating loneliness to one-person households is an assumption with a hole big enough you can drive a bus filled with family, friends and pets through it.

Still, a recent “Loneliest Cities in America” list based on that assumption is getting traction online, including coverage by cnbc.com.

Washington D.C. tops the 30-city list. Rounding out the top 10, in descending order: Birmingham; St. Louis; Atlanta; Cleveland; Pittsburgh; Cincinnati; Alexandria, Virginia; Minneapolis, and Richmond, Virginia.

In addition to Birmingham in the number two spot, Mobile at 28 gives Alabama two cities on the list. Ohio, Missouri and Florida set the pace among states, with three cities each.

This list was released by chamberofcommerce.org, a website that self-identifies as “the go-to digital resource for small business owners and entrepreneurs.” Past analyses by the website have been cited by noteworthy media including New York Times and Forbes.

Chamberofcommerce.org introduces their “Loneliest Cities in America 2024″ list with the assertion, “Living alone is more common than ever in the United States. Nationwide, more than 37 million Americans live alone, representing 29 percent of all U.S. households, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.”

Living alone has increased by nearly 5 million within a decade, a trend accelerated by the pandemic, according to chamberofcommerce.org.

To determine their “Loneliest Cities in America” list, chamberofcommerce.org staff analyzed more than 170 census-defined places with a population of 150,000 or more via the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey.

To determine the average year-over-year increase, they analyzed 2021-2022 one-person household data. Data from the American Community Survey was not available for 2020 due to the pandemic, according to chamberofcommerce.org.

The “Loneliest Cities” blurb for Birmingham reads: “Among Birmingham’s 88,889 households, nearly half (48 percent) are occupied by one person. During the pandemic, the city experienced a 11.4 percent increase in residents living alone and that trend seems to be continuing. Year-over-year, the number of people living alone in Birmingham spiked by more than 3,800, according to the Census Bureau. “

In addition to an overall “Loneliest Cities” list, the website broke down by gender. St. Louis topped the “loneliest” cities for males, while Alexandria, Virginia, topped “loneliest” for females. Birmingham made the top five for both.

These kinds of social-media-shares-friendly lists are thrown around like confetti though. Just last year, U.S. News & World Report ranked Bham number 80 in their’s “Best Places to Live in the U.S. for 2023-2024” list, which was topped by Green Bay, Wisconsin.

In that U.S. News blurb, writer Raymonda Rice described Birmingham as, “the cultural epicenter of Alabama.” And a city with, “many of the allures of urban life with a more affordable price tag than you’ll find in many similarly-sized metro areas.”