What's the correct way to write the general location of someone in the USA? [closed]

I'd like to write where someone is from, on a website with an international context. The objective is to balance style, brevity and correctness. I only need country-level resolution, so if someone is from Berlin, I plan on writing Germany, whereas if they're from Sydney, I plan on writing Australia.

I suspect that the USA should be an exception here, as I often heard people from the States feel very much associated with their state (I heard a lot more Chicago, Illinois than, say, Sydney, New South Wales).

Does this sound like a reasonable assumption? How should I write the state/country pair in this case? Illinois, United States? United States, Illinois? Something else altogether?

Edit: another small tidbit, the lion's share of the target audience is in the teenager/young adult age range.

Solution 1:

In the US we usually write Berkeley, CA, which is the name of the city followed by state. That said, if you were treating people on a country level, simply writing the US or USA would suffice.

Solution 2:

The customary format would be to include city name and two-letter state abbreviation (e.g. Seattle, WA, USA). Showing the full state name acceptable, but not necessary.

Only including the state (e.g. Washington, USA) can be ambiguous and vastly imprecise (California and Texas are larger than most countries). Some publications (The Economist magazine) use this, but it seems highbrow, unusual and weird to a teenage audience. It would look wrong next to city-state pairs from other countries (e.g. Berlin, Germany).

Only listing the city is ambiguous, as city names repeat often in the USA (there are 28 Springfields).

Solution 3:

If you're using "country-level resolution" for other countries, doing the same for the US is reasonable and consistent. As I understand it, you wouldn't say someone is from Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, or Manitoba, Canada, so there's no reason to refer to Illinois, United States. The USA is a very mobile country, so identifying someone with a state is problematic. It's not unusual for someone to have grown up in Connecticut, gone to college in Massachusetts, and worked in Maryland. Would you cite them by place of birth, place where they've spent most of their time, place of current residence, or something else? That can of worms is better left unopened.