Photo: Clockkicker at English Wikipedia, Robert Gunn (www.ourgun.blogspot.com) · Public domainMonticello has some of the highest unemployment in the country: 14.3%
Measured by household income, Monticello is behind 89% of U.S. towns. The two grades for Monticello are D for jobs and income and C− for walkability. About one in five work in Monticello; the top destination outside it is Covington (6%, 23 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Jobs and commuting in Monticello: the gist
What’s behind Monticello’s Jobs & income grade
The poverty rate holds Monticello’s grade up (16.3%, U.S. 12.5%); unemployment pulls it down.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Monticello could be anywhere from D− to C−.
Commuting from Monticello: about 35 minutes a trip
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 11.1 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Monticello workers work from home, vs 16% across Georgia. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 974 commuters (the 10% who work from home are left out). Across Georgia: 84% drive alone, 1% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Monticello by day and by night
On a workday 710 residents head out to work, 208 work right here, and 1,112 people come in from elsewhere.
About 3,400 people are in Monticello on a workday afternoon, 13% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.44 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.
Where Monticello’s working residents head each day
Where Monticello clocks in
6% of workers
4% of workers
3% 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.
The kinds of work in Monticello
1,320 jobs are based in Monticello.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Monticello, 2014 → 2024: 1,176 → 1,320. 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 Monticello’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far it is to work from Monticello
About 27% 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.
In Monticello, most people drive to work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Monticello is more walkable than 22% of U.S. towns, #231 of 263 in Georgia. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 3.1% across Georgia.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 1,085 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service: no data. EPA’s transit file has no stops for most of this county (its agencies had not published schedules in the format EPA used in 2020). That is missing data, not a finding that there is no bus or train.
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 12.6% of Monticello households have no vehicle (Georgia 5.9%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Monticello’s commuters take a bus or train.
Monticello next to U.S. towns of 2,100 to 4,100
| # | 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% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 95 | Avondale Estates GA | 3,543 | $124K | 6.3% | 0.9% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 259 | Ball Ground GA | 3,470 | $118K | 1.8% | 1.8% | 2% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 336 | Chattahoochee Hills GA | 3,524 | $112K | 1.1% | 3.8% | 4% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 4,455 | Eastpoint FL | 3,163 | $68K | 18.8% | 16.4% | 16% | D |
| 4,456 | Slocomb AL | 2,226 | $38K | 32.8% | 10.0% | 6% | D |
| 4,457 | Monticello GA | 3,040 | $49K | 16.3% | 14.3% | 23% | D |
| 4,458 | Buffalo MO | 3,550 | $40K | 22.3% | 7.5% | 16% | D |
| 4,459 | Oneida TN | 3,899 | $49K | 28.1% | 5.3% | 18% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 4,771 | Lake Isabella CA | 4,059 | $27K | 40.7% | 8.6% | 19% | 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 Monticello, the top three, the last and three more from Georgia.
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.
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Monticello: questions
What is the median household income in Monticello?
$48,812 (±$4,014) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $77,353 across Georgia and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Monticello?
16.3%, against 13.4% across Georgia and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Monticello?
35 minutes each way on average, against 28 across Georgia and 26 nationally. 10% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Monticello work?
23% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Covington (6%, 23 mi), Macon-Bibb County (4%, 34 mi), Madison (3%, 23 mi) (Census LEHD 2024).
Is Monticello walkable?
Monticello is more walkable than 22% of U.S. towns (Walkability C−): an EPA walkability index of 6.9 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Monticello without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 13% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Monticello, from the people who make the trip.
More of Monticello
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.