Photo: Stepheng3 at English Wikipedia · Public domainGraton has higher household incomes than 69% of U.S. towns
Transit is limited for a town this walkable: about 0.7 trips an hour stop near the typical resident at the evening peak, against 1.0 in Santa Rosa. Poverty touches 24.3% of residents (California 12.0%). Jobs and income earn Graton B−; getting around on foot earns it A−.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Graton and work: the main findings
Graton and Santa Rosa trade workers both ways
Santa Rosa is the top workplace for Graton residents (19%) and also where the most people who work in Graton come from (32% of its jobs). The commute map ↓
Graton makes and builds things
65% of the jobs based in Graton are in goods: factories, construction and farms. Across the jobs Graton residents hold, wherever they work, it’s 24%. The jobs ↓
A lot of Graton works from home
36% of Graton workers work from home, against 17% across California. Time on the road ↓
Written from the Census figures on this page. Commute flows, distances and jobs are Census LEHD 2023, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey; with 700 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Inside Graton’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Graton is better than 46% of U.S. towns. Household income holds Graton’s grade up ($91,429, U.S. $80,734); the poverty rate pulls it down. It also does well on job access by car.
Unemployment (5.7%) is left out: Graton’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Graton could be anywhere from D to B+.
19% of working residents work in Santa Rosa
Where Graton clocks in
19% of workers
6% 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.
Factories, building and farms: 65% of the jobs in Graton
639 jobs are based in Graton.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Graton, 2013 → 2023: 753 → 639. 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 Graton’s own residents hold wherever they work.
From Graton, about 25 minutes to the job
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.9 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Graton workers work from home, vs 17% across California. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 452 commuters (the 36% 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 daily flow of workers through Graton
On a workday 667 residents head out to work, 33 work right here, and 606 people come in from elsewhere.
About as many people by day as by night: the people who leave are replaced by the people who come in.
About as many jobs as working residents (0.91 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
How far it is to work from Graton
About 24% 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.
Walkable streets, thin transit: Graton
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Graton is more walkable than 83% of U.S. towns. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 3.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 7.1% across California.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 708 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). Nearly all residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 0.7 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 53% 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). 3.2% of Graton households have no vehicle (California 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Graton’s commuters take a bus or train.
Among U.S. towns of 1,300 to 2,400, Graton ranks 2,283rd of 5,343 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Plandome NY | 1,482 | $250K | 0.9% | 1.4% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Hewlett Harbor NY | 1,332 | $250K | 1.9% | 7.2% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 19 | Baywood Park CA | 1,580 | $217K | 2.8% | 1.6% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 67 | Irwindale CA | 1,439 | $114K | 4.3% | 6.5% | 14% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 71 | Del Rio CA | 1,508 | $250K | 0.0% | 2.2% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 2,281 | Charlevoix Township MI | 1,797 | $81K | 7.1% | 2.2% | 11% | B− |
| 2,282 | Eckles Township MN | 1,945 | $78K | 8.0% | 6.0% | 2% | B− |
| 2,283 | Graton CA | 1,806 | $91K | 24.3% | 5.7% | 5% | B− |
| 2,284 | Hurley MS | 1,305 | $133K | 12.6% | 4.7% | 1% | B− |
| 2,285 | Odell OR | 2,218 | $97K | 4.5% | 9.7% | 12% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 5,343 | Paraje NM | 1,333 | $33K | 61.7% | 0.0% | 0% | 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 Graton, the top three, the last and three more from California.
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 Graton: questions
What is the median household income in Graton?
$91,429 (±$49,642) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $99,122 across California and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Graton?
24.3%, against 12.0% across California and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Graton?
25 minutes each way on average, against 29 across California and 26 nationally. 36% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Graton work?
5% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Santa Rosa (19%, 9 mi), Sebastopol (6%, 3 mi), San Francisco (6%, 52 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Graton walkable?
Graton is more walkable than 83% of U.S. towns (Walkability A−): an EPA walkability index of 10.6 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Graton without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 3% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Graton, from the people who make the trip.
More of Graton
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.