Los Angeles Named Nation’s Smug Capital

The greater Los Angeles region surpassed San Francisco and New York as the nation’s smug capital, in part because of a change in method of ranking, federal officials said. Self-satisfaction in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties exceeded smug standards on 52 days this year.

“It’s a tough job cleaning up the smirking at this point,” said Jim Hirsch, planning and rules manager for the West Los Angeles Self-Righteousness Management District, the region’s main smug-fighting agency. Smirking is one of the components of smug.

But Los Angeles’ rank comes with an asterisk. This year smug measurements were switched from measuring smug over a one-hour period to measuring it over an six-hour span. Under the old system, San Francisco would have edged out Los Angeles for the top spot by violating the standard on 43 days compared with 40 days.

Although it led the nation in smug days, the Los Angeles region’s self-righteousness is considerably better than it used to be. The federal standards were violated on 82 days in 2004 and 112 days in 2003. In 1984, it exceeded standards for more than half the year.