Photo: Orange Suede Sofa · CC BY-SA 3.0Tripoli has fewer jobs than working residents: 0.4 for each
245 jobs are based in Tripoli; 551 of its residents have a job. The two grades for Tripoli are B for jobs and income and C+ for walkability. Only 7% work in Tripoli itself; outside it, Waverly draws the most (17%, 12 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
What sets Tripoli apart on work
What’s behind Tripoli’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Tripoli is better than 62% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Tripoli’s grade up (3.3%, U.S. 12.5%); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 28% of U.S. towns). It also does well on household income.
Unemployment (3.1%) is left out: Tripoli’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Tripoli could be anywhere from B− to B+.
How long Tripoli spends getting to work: about 27 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.5 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Tripoli workers work from home, vs 11% across Iowa. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 561 commuters (the 5% 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.
The daily commute in and out of Tripoli
On a workday 512 residents head out to work, 39 work right here, and 206 people come in from elsewhere.
About 900 people are in Tripoli on a workday afternoon, 25% fewer 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.
Where people from Tripoli work
Where Tripoli clocks in
17% of workers
17% of workers
8% 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 Tripoli
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Tripoli, 2013 → 2023: 270 → 245. 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 Tripoli’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Near or far: the trip to work from Tripoli
About 22% 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.
Most trips from Tripoli start in a car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Tripoli is more walkable than 44% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 2.6% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 4.4% across Iowa, on an EPA index of 6.0.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 591 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). 2.3% of Tripoli households have no vehicle (Iowa 5.4%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Tripoli’s commuters take a bus or train.
Tripoli next to U.S. towns of 800 to 1,600: 980th of 4,312 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Baxter Estates NY | 1,014 | $154K | 1.0% | 3.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 83 | University Heights IA | 1,177 | $111K | 14.5% | 1.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 97 | Walford IA | 1,359 | $129K | 1.1% | 2.8% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 185 | Gilbert IA | 1,389 | $123K | 3.4% | 4.1% | 8% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 978 | South Newton Township PA | 1,393 | $78K | 6.8% | 1.5% | 1% | B |
| 979 | Sunday Lake WA | 1,375 | $92K | 8.9% | 10.0% | 0% | B |
| 980 | Tripoli IA | 1,208 | $78K | 3.3% | 3.1% | 7% | B |
| 981 | Loda Township IL | 1,388 | $94K | 5.0% | 1.4% | 3% | B |
| 982 | Illiopolis Township IL | 1,198 | $83K | 6.8% | 4.1% | 1% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 4,312 | Oglala SD | 1,071 | $21K | 68.8% | 26.5% | 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 Tripoli, 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 Tripoli: questions
What is the median household income in Tripoli?
$78,324 (±$7,068) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $75,059 across Iowa and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Tripoli?
3.3%, against 11.1% across Iowa and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Tripoli?
27 minutes each way on average, against 20 across Iowa and 26 nationally. 5% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Tripoli work?
7% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Waverly (17%, 12 mi), Waterloo (17%, 22 mi), Cedar Falls (8%, 22 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Tripoli walkable?
Tripoli is more walkable than 44% of U.S. towns (Walkability C+): an EPA walkability index of 6.0 out of 20, and 3% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Tripoli without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 2% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Tripoli, from the people who make the trip.
More of Tripoli
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.