While PA is way better than NY, it is sliding down hill fast. I lived there for 27 years, and still have friends that live there.
And, if you are from upstate NY, you will slit your throat moving down to the Lehigh Valley area. My family, and my wife's family are from down there. My head nearly explodes when it takes me 45 minutes to go 13 miles to visit someone. When I was younger it was a 15 minute ride.
Everything from Allentown to NYC is becoming an extension of NYC. It's pushing up land prices and taxes.
My informal research tells me that the solution is to find a state with out a big liberal city to force it's will on the rest of the state. Unfortunately, with the steel mills dying off, Pittsburg is becoming liberal. Philly and Harrisburg already are liberal.
Given your travel constraints, I'd look to VT or NH. Personally, I'm looking west. When the timing is right I'll be headed for the Dakota's, Montana, Wyoming, or Idaho.
Doesn't it suck, when the politicians, liberals, and elitists ruin a state for the people who bust their asses to make their life easy?
Unfortunately, as more of "us" move out of a state, more of "them" take over. The more states they take over, the more control they exert over the fed. And eventually, they still screw us by working through the feds.