Dahlonega School #1 · Photo: Jim Roberts · CC BY-SA 4.0Ottumwa’s household incomes are lower than in 72% of U.S. towns
For jobs and income Ottumwa is better than 28% of U.S. towns (C); for walkability it is more walkable than 62% of U.S. towns (B). 17.2% of residents live below the poverty line (Iowa 11.1%). About half stay in Ottumwa for work; outside it, Des Moines is the main destination (3%, 72 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Ottumwa and work: the main findings
What’s behind Ottumwa’s Jobs & income grade
Job access by car holds Ottumwa’s grade up (ahead of 45% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Ottumwa could be anywhere from C− to C+.
How long Ottumwa spends getting to work: about 18 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 5.7 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Ottumwa workers work from home, vs 11% across Iowa. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 10,990 commuters (the 4% who work from home are left out). Across Iowa: 86% 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.
In and out of Ottumwa on a workday
On a workday 5,551 residents head out to work, 5,413 work right here, and 6,905 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 (1.12 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.
Where Ottumwa goes to work
Where Ottumwa clocks in
3% of workers
2% 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.
Goods, not services: 32% of the jobs in Ottumwa
12,318 jobs are based in Ottumwa.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Ottumwa, 2013 → 2023: 13,164 → 12,318. 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 Ottumwa’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The distance from Ottumwa to work
About 29% 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.
The commute in Ottumwa is mostly behind the wheel
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 11,487 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). 7.7% of Ottumwa households have no vehicle (Iowa 5.4%, U.S. 8.4%). 1% of Ottumwa’s commuters take a bus or train.
Ottumwa places 1,300th of 1,516 on jobs and income among U.S. towns of 18,000 to 34,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Springfield VA | 22,532 | $163K | 1.9% | 1.7% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Mountain Brook AL | 21,661 | $201K | 3.2% | 1.2% | 8% | A+ |
| 3 | Lake Forest IL | 19,731 | $235K | 3.5% | 1.8% | 12% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 395 | Johnston IA | 25,065 | $107K | 10.2% | 2.1% | 14% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 409 | Clive IA | 19,861 | $132K | 7.3% | 4.0% | 7% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 477 | North Liberty IA | 21,976 | $102K | 6.1% | 3.3% | 9% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 1,298 | Cloverleaf TX | 24,063 | $55K | 24.0% | 7.5% | 1% | C |
| 1,299 | Marquette MI | 21,944 | $56K | 22.4% | 4.3% | 56% | C |
| 1,300 | Ottumwa IA | 25,319 | $61K | 17.2% | 4.6% | 49% | C |
| 1,301 | Mesquite NV | 24,001 | $75K | 10.6% | 5.7% | 55% | C |
| 1,302 | Whitehall OH | 19,805 | $52K | 16.4% | 8.8% | 5% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 1,516 | Nogales AZ | 19,495 | $43K | 28.0% | 15.7% | 37% | 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 Ottumwa, the top three, the last and three more from Iowa.
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 Ottumwa: questions
What is the median household income in Ottumwa?
$61,103 (±$4,338) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $75,059 across Iowa and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Ottumwa?
17.2%, against 11.1% across Iowa and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Ottumwa?
18 minutes each way on average, against 20 across Iowa and 26 nationally. 4% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Ottumwa work?
49% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Des Moines (3%, 72 mi), Oskaloosa (3%, 22 mi), Fairfield (2%, 24 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Ottumwa walkable?
Ottumwa is more walkable than 62% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 7.7 out of 20, and 3% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Ottumwa without a car?
1% of commuters take transit and 8% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Ottumwa, from the people who make the trip.
More of Ottumwa
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.