Photo: Green254 · CC BY-SA 4.0With 0.5 jobs for every working resident, most of Gillespie works elsewhere
About one in ten work in Gillespie itself; outside it, Litchfield draws the most (7%, 9 miles). 663 jobs are based in Gillespie, against 1,359 working residents. Gillespie grades C for jobs and income and C+ for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Gillespie and work: the main findings
Jobs & income in Gillespie: the grade in detail
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Gillespie is better than 34% of U.S. towns, #601 of 768 in Illinois. Household income holds Gillespie’s grade up ($82,772, U.S. $80,734); the poverty rate pulls it down (17.1%, U.S. 12.5%).
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Gillespie could be anywhere from C− to B+.
Mostly health care, schools and offices in Gillespie
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Gillespie, 2013 → 2023: 702 → 663. 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 Gillespie’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Who commutes out of Gillespie, and who commutes in
On a workday 1,243 residents head out to work, 116 work right here, and 547 people come in from elsewhere.
About 2,400 people are in Gillespie on a workday afternoon, 23% 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.
Commuting out of Gillespie: the destinations
Where Gillespie clocks in
7% of workers
5% 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.
Each way, about 28 minutes from Gillespie
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 9 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Gillespie workers work from home, vs 16% across Illinois. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,126 commuters (the 14% who work from home are left out). Across Illinois: 78% drive alone, 7% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
How far Gillespie goes to work
About 19% 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.
For most of Gillespie, work means a drive
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Gillespie is more walkable than 38% of U.S. towns, #615 of 768 in Illinois. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 10.8% across Illinois.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 1,303 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). 4.9% of Gillespie households have no vehicle (Illinois 11.0%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Gillespie’s commuters take a bus or train.
For jobs and income, Gillespie is 2,972nd of 4,562 U.S. towns of 2,200 to 4,200
| # | 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% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 20 | Deer Park IL | 3,647 | $174K | 1.3% | 2.3% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 2,970 | Friona TX | 4,051 | $67K | 8.9% | 4.8% | 20% | C |
| 2,971 | Enosburgh VT | 2,780 | $64K | 13.9% | 1.9% | 12% | C |
| 2,972 | Gillespie IL | 3,083 | $83K | 17.1% | 4.8% | 9% | C |
| 2,973 | De Soto Township IL | 2,276 | $71K | 12.0% | 5.7% | 3% | C |
| 2,974 | Franklin Township OH | 2,624 | $62K | 7.1% | 5.7% | 3% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 4,562 | Lake Isabella CA | 4,059 | $27K | 40.7% | 8.6% | 18% | 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 Gillespie, the top three, the last and three more from Illinois.
Work in the towns next to Gillespie
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Gillespie workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gillespie | – | C | C+ | 28 min | $82,772 |
| East Gillespie | under 2% | — | — | 29 min | — |
Same-state neighbors only. East Gillespie: fewer than 1,000 residents, not graded. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Gillespie’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 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 Gillespie: questions
What is the median household income in Gillespie?
$82,772 (±$10,405) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $83,390 across Illinois and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Gillespie?
17.1%, against 11.8% across Illinois and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Gillespie?
28 minutes each way on average, against 28 across Illinois and 26 nationally. 14% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Gillespie work?
9% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Litchfield (7%, 9 mi), Springfield (7%, 47 mi), Carlinville (5%, 11 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Gillespie walkable?
Gillespie is more walkable than 38% of U.S. towns (Walkability C+): an EPA walkability index of 8.6 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Gillespie without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 5% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Gillespie, from the people who make the trip.
More of Gillespie
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.