Photo: Bonus Onus · CC BY-SA 3.0Waimea draws 2,664 commuters a day, with 4.1 jobs for every working resident
The two grades for Waimea are C for jobs and income and C for walkability. Waimea has 2,787 jobs, and 683 of its residents work somewhere. 19% of workers have no commute at all; Hawaii has 10%.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Getting to work from Waimea, in brief
Waimea has far more jobs than workers
Waimea has 2,787 jobs, 4.1 for every working resident. Day and night ↓
Waimea’s biggest commute is a long one
The top workplace outside Waimea is Urban Honolulu, 170 miles away as the crow flies. 25% of working residents (170) make that trip; no town closer to home draws more of them. How far ↓
A big share show a job far from home
48% of working residents have a main job more than 50 miles away. Part of that is employers that report every worker at one head office, so not all of those trips happen daily. How far ↓
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 683 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
How the Jobs & income grade adds up in Waimea
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Waimea is better than 35% of U.S. towns, #73 of 93 in Hawaii. Household income holds Waimea’s grade up ($100,198, U.S. $80,734); job access by car pulls it down.
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Waimea could be anywhere from D to B+.
Who works in Waimea, and who works elsewhere
On a workday 560 residents head out to work and 123 work right here.
About 11,000 people are in Waimea on a workday afternoon, 23% more than live here.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
The commute from Waimea, by distance
About 48% 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.
Where Waimea’s workforce comes from
Where Waimea clocks in
Lines 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 Waimea
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Waimea, 2013 → 2023: 2,567 → 2,787. 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 Waimea’s own residents hold wherever they work.
A commute of about 27 minutes in Waimea
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.7 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Waimea workers work from home, vs 10% across Hawaii. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 3,620 commuters (the 19% who work from home are left out). Across Hawaii: 72% drive alone, 4% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Getting around Waimea: mostly by car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Waimea is more walkable than 33% of U.S. towns, #77 of 93 in Hawaii. Both inputs place Waimea 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 4,463 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). 0.9% of Waimea households have no vehicle (Hawaii 8.2%, U.S. 8.4%). <1% of Waimea’s commuters take a bus or train.
For jobs and income, Waimea is 2,076th of 2,841 U.S. towns of 6,500 to 12,500
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Des Peres MO | 9,102 | $224K | 2.0% | 0.5% | 5% | A+ |
| 2 | Pimmit Hills VA | 6,589 | $173K | 1.6% | 1.3% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Braddock VA | 6,536 | $212K | 0.9% | 1.0% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 90 | Waikele HI | 7,528 | $121K | 3.7% | 1.3% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 335 | East Kapolei HI | 7,551 | $119K | 5.3% | 2.5% | 2% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 421 | Aiea HI | 9,087 | $140K | 5.3% | 3.8% | 2% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 2,074 | North Madison OH | 8,594 | $68K | 9.9% | 6.8% | 2% | C |
| 2,075 | South Cleveland TN | 7,452 | $67K | 10.2% | 8.6% | 1% | C |
| 2,076 | Waimea HI | 9,286 | $100K | 12.3% | 5.4% | 18% | C |
| 2,077 | Clewiston FL | 7,594 | $57K | 16.3% | 1.3% | 26% | C |
| 2,078 | Clute TX | 10,821 | $70K | 10.4% | 8.6% | 16% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 2,841 | Shiprock NM | 7,610 | $36K | 34.6% | 14.9% | 14% | 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 Waimea, the top three, the last and three more from Hawaii.
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 Waimea: questions
What is the median household income in Waimea?
$100,198 (±$16,131) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $100,389 across Hawaii and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Waimea?
12.3%, against 10.0% across Hawaii and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Waimea?
27 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Hawaii and 26 nationally. 19% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Waimea work?
18% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Urban Honolulu (25%, 170 mi), Hilo (7%, 42 mi), Waikoloa Beach Resort (6%, 17 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Waimea walkable?
Waimea is more walkable than 33% of U.S. towns (Walkability C): an EPA walkability index of 6.4 out of 20, and 1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Waimea without a car?
<1% of commuters take transit and 1% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Waimea, from the people who make the trip.
More of Waimea
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.