Photo: Don DeBold from San Jose, CA, USA · CC BY 2.0Santa Cruz’s family incomes are higher than in 94% of U.S. towns
Jobs and income earn Santa Cruz B+; getting around on foot earns it A+. Not counting college students, poverty touches 10.9% of residents, against 11.6% across California. For a town this walkable, transit is thin: about 6.5 trips an hour at the evening peak near the typical resident, next to 17.5 in Los Angeles.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Santa Cruz at work: what stands out
Santa Cruz’s Jobs & income grade, measure by measure
On family income, poverty and job access, Santa Cruz is better than 75% of U.S. towns, #233 of 847 in California. Family income holds Santa Cruz’s grade up ($170,818, U.S. $99,999); the poverty rate pulls it down. It also does well on job access by car.
30% of Santa Cruz’s residents are college students, and off-campus students count in the Census poverty figures. Where students are 15% or more of the people the Census checks for poverty (19% here), the grade uses the rate without them: 10.9%, against 17.0% for all residents. Unemployment (7.2%) is left out here: students looking for part-time work count as unemployed. Income is ranked as median family income ($170,818), since student households pull the household median down ($115,475).
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for family income and poverty, Santa Cruz could be anywhere from B+ to A−.
A commute of about 23 minutes in Santa Cruz
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Santa Cruz workers work from home, vs 17% across California. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 23,745 commuters (the 22% 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.
In and out of Santa Cruz on a workday
On a workday 14,360 residents head out to work, 5,865 work right here, and 21,972 people come in from elsewhere.
About 69,000 people are in Santa Cruz on a workday afternoon, 12% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.38 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2024, primary jobs.
6% of working residents work in San Jose
Where Santa Cruz clocks in
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.
What Santa Cruz’s employers do
27,837 jobs are based in Santa Cruz.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Santa Cruz, 2014 → 2024: 26,225 → 27,837. 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 2024.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Santa Cruz’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Where in the region Santa Cruz works
About 23% 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 2024.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
Santa Cruz is more walkable than most U.S. towns, with limited transit
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Santa Cruz is among the most walkable U.S. towns, #11 of 847 in California. Both inputs place Santa Cruz near the same point nationally.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 30,501 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 97% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 48% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 6.5 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 88% 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). 8.0% of Santa Cruz households have no vehicle (California 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 6% of Santa Cruz’s commuters take a bus or train.
Santa Cruz next to U.S. towns of 43,000 to 83,000: 287th of 720 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | McLean VA | 49,627 | $250K | 2.9% | 2.3% | 6% | A+ |
| 2 | Lakeville MN | 79,270 | $139K | 2.9% | 2.0% | 11% | A+ |
| 3 | Fulshear TX | 64,630 | $187K | 1.6% | 2.8% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 33 | Cupertino CA | 58,333 | $235K | 4.1% | 4.0% | 11% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 41 | South San Francisco CA | 64,941 | $137K | 6.7% | 2.8% | 12% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 48 | Dublin CA | 71,602 | $214K | 4.5% | 3.8% | 6% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 285 | Wellington FL | 62,662 | $116K | 7.8% | 4.7% | 13% | B+ |
| 286 | West Lafayette IN | 45,747 | $35K | 37.3% | 4.5% | 34% | B+ |
| 287 | Santa Cruz CA | 61,797 | $115K | 17.0% | 7.2% | 29% | B+ |
| 288 | Coon Rapids MN | 64,193 | $88K | 8.2% | 4.5% | 11% | B+ |
| 289 | Normal IL | 53,275 | $65K | 21.4% | 3.9% | 27% | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 720 | Bullhead City AZ | 43,987 | $51K | 18.7% | 11.5% | 25% | 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 Santa Cruz, the top three, the last and three more from California.
Next door to Santa Cruz
The biggest share goes to Live Oak (4%).
Average commute minutes, one way
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Santa Cruz workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Santa Cruz | – | B+ | A+ | 23 min | $115,475 |
| Live Oak | 4% | B | A+ | 22 min | $103,674 |
| Paradise Park | under 2% | — | — | — | — |
| Pasatiempo | under 2% | — | — | 39 min | — |
| Twin Lakes | under 2% | B | A+ | 21 min | $90,087 |
Same-state neighbors only. Paradise Park and Pasatiempo: fewer than 1,000 residents, not graded. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Santa Cruz’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 2024, primary jobs, where the employer reports them. Income, poverty, unemployment, commute time and how people travel: Census ACS 2020–24 averages.
- Students. 30% of residents are college students; the poverty input leaves off-campus students out (above).
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Santa Cruz: questions
What is the median household income in Santa Cruz?
$115,475 (±$6,419) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $99,122 across California and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Santa Cruz?
17.0% of residents live below the poverty line; leaving out college students, 10.9%. California: 12.0%.
How long is the commute from Santa Cruz?
23 minutes each way on average, against 29 across California and 26 nationally. 22% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Santa Cruz work?
29% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are San Jose (6%, 25 mi), Live Oak (4%, 3 mi), San Francisco (4%, 59 mi) (Census LEHD 2024).
Is Santa Cruz walkable?
Santa Cruz is among the most walkable U.S. towns (Walkability A+): an EPA walkability index of 14.3 out of 20, and 24% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Santa Cruz without a car?
6% of commuters take transit and 8% of households have no car. 48% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Santa Cruz, from the people who make the trip.
More of Santa Cruz
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2024, 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.