Household incomes in Aromas top those of 95% of U.S. towns
Aromas grades A for jobs and income and C for walkability. Poverty touches 3.1% of residents; California has 12.0%. Only 2% work in Aromas; the top destination outside it is Watsonville (10%, 8 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Aromas at work: what stands out
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Aromas
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Aromas is better than 93% of U.S. towns, #40 of 847 in California. Household income is its strongest input ($148,438, U.S. $80,734); job access by car ranks lowest, though still above most U.S. towns (ahead of 53% of U.S. towns). It also does well on the poverty rate and unemployment and job access by car.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Aromas could be anywhere from B to A+.
Goods jobs make up 73% of work in Aromas
470 jobs are based in Aromas.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Aromas, 2013 → 2023: 231 → 470. Big swings can come from how a large employer reports its locations, not only from real openings or closings.
Primary jobs covered by unemployment insurance (not the self-employed). Pay is monthly earnings. LEHD 2023.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Aromas’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Aromas by day and by night
On a workday 1,038 residents head out to work, 18 work right here, and 452 people come in from elsewhere.
About 2,700 people are in Aromas on a workday afternoon, 18% fewer than live here.
0.45 jobs for every working resident, so most people commute out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
Where people from Aromas work
Where Aromas clocks in
10% of workers
9% of workers
8% of workersLines run between town centers. The top 10 towns each way; “Everywhere else” is the rest, including other states.
A thicker line means more commuters. Switch between where residents work and where the people who work here live.
About 26 minutes each way, quicker than most of California
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Aromas workers work from home, vs 17% across California. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,311 commuters (the 21% who work from home are left out). Across California: 79% drive alone, 3% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
The distance from Aromas to work
About 22% show a job over 50 miles away. Some of that is real, and some is employers that report every worker at a head office, so a few long commutes are on paper only.
Straight-line distance from each worker’s home block to their main job’s block. LEHD 2023.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
In Aromas, the car does most of the work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Aromas is more walkable than 32% of U.S. towns, #771 of 847 in California. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 4.2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 7.1% across California, on an EPA index of 3.3.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 1,655 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 0% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about under 0.1 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 20% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 0.8% of Aromas households have no vehicle (California 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Aromas’ commuters take a bus or train.
For jobs and income, Aromas is 285th of 4,453 U.S. towns of 2,300 to 4,400
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kenilworth IL | 2,437 | $250K | 2.1% | 4.0% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Riverwoods IL | 3,766 | $249K | 0.7% | 0.7% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 26 | Del Mar CA | 3,858 | $199K | 2.7% | 1.8% | 9% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 41 | Harmony Grove CA | 2,585 | $227K | 4.6% | 0.0% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 95 | Ross CA | 2,304 | $250K | 4.8% | 0.7% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 283 | Carnation WA | 2,471 | $153K | 1.6% | 2.5% | 2% | A |
| 284 | Apple Creek Township ND | 3,515 | $157K | 2.2% | 1.9% | 1% | A |
| 285 | Aromas CA | 3,245 | $148K | 3.1% | 2.1% | 2% | A |
| 286 | Hahnville LA | 3,520 | $101K | 6.7% | 0.0% | 8% | A |
| 287 | Edgewood FL | 2,845 | $81K | 5.0% | 1.2% | 2% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 4,453 | Lake Isabella CA | 4,059 | $27K | 40.7% | 8.6% | 18% | D− |
Census ACS 2020–24 (income, poverty, unemployment), Census LEHD (work in town), TownRatings Jobs & income grades. Each town links to its Work & commute page.
Ranked on the Jobs & income grade: the towns either side of Aromas, the top three, the last and three more from California.
Work in the towns next to Aromas
Jobs & commute next door
The biggest share goes to Prunedale. Darker towns draw more of Aromas’s workers. Tap a town to see its commute.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2023, primary jobs, where the employer reports them. Income, poverty, unemployment, commute time and how people travel: Census ACS 2020–24 averages.
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Aromas: questions
What is the median household income in Aromas?
$148,438 (±$66,260) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $99,122 across California and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Aromas?
3.1%, against 12.0% across California and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Aromas?
26 minutes each way on average, against 29 across California and 26 nationally. 21% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Aromas work?
2% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Watsonville (10%, 8 mi), San Jose (9%, 31 mi), Salinas (8%, 13 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Aromas walkable?
Aromas is more walkable than 32% of U.S. towns (Walkability C): an EPA walkability index of 3.3 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Aromas without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 1% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Aromas, from the people who make the trip.
More of Aromas
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2023, primary jobs. Commute time, working from home and working out of state: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates. Distances are straight lines between home and work; real drives run longer. Walkability index, job access and transit service: U.S. EPA Smart Location Database. The two grades are our own summaries of these figures, not official ratings.