Photo: TheCatalyst31 · CC BY-SA 4.0Kirkland has fewer jobs than working residents: 0.3 for each
Employers in Kirkland report 238 jobs, against 751 working residents. Kirkland grades A− for jobs and income and B− for walkability. For 7% of workers, the job is at home, next to 16% for Illinois as a whole.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The work figures that set Kirkland apart
Inside Kirkland’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Kirkland is better than 78% of U.S. towns. All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Kirkland’s grade. It also does well on the poverty rate and job access by car.
Unemployment (3.1%) is left out: Kirkland’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, Kirkland could be anywhere from B to A.
Getting to work from Kirkland takes about 34 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 10.8 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Kirkland workers work from home, vs 16% across Illinois. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 826 commuters (the 7% 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.
Who works in Kirkland, and who works elsewhere
On a workday 732 residents head out to work, 19 work right here, and 219 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,100 people are in Kirkland on a workday afternoon, 31% 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 Kirkland goes to work
Where Kirkland clocks in
7% of workers
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.
Factories, building and farms: 46% of the jobs in Kirkland
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Kirkland, 2013 → 2023: 310 → 238. 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 Kirkland’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far Kirkland’s workers travel
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.
Few in Kirkland walk, bike or ride to work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Kirkland is more walkable than 49% of U.S. towns. Both inputs place Kirkland 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 891 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). 1.6% of Kirkland households have no vehicle (Illinois 11.0%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Kirkland’s commuters take a bus or train.
797th of 6,161: where Kirkland ranks among U.S. towns of 1,100 to 2,200
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 27 | Tower Lakes IL | 1,201 | $154K | 2.0% | 2.8% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 30 | Third Lake IL | 1,103 | $150K | 2.0% | 2.3% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 40 | Bannockburn IL | 1,308 | $214K | 5.1% | 1.8% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 795 | Grand Prairie Township OH | 1,539 | $95K | 1.3% | 0.0% | 2% | A− |
| 796 | Crocker WA | 1,254 | $110K | 6.5% | 1.4% | 1% | A− |
| 797 | Kirkland IL | 1,632 | $94K | 6.8% | 3.1% | 3% | A− |
| 798 | South Amherst OH | 1,488 | $86K | 6.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A− |
| 799 | Van Buren Township IN | 1,969 | $94K | 4.9% | 0.0% | 1% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 6,161 | Paraje NM | 1,333 | $33K | 61.7% | 0.0% | 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 Kirkland, the top three, the last and three more from Illinois.
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 Kirkland: questions
What is the median household income in Kirkland?
$94,338 (±$9,376) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $83,390 across Illinois and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Kirkland?
6.8%, against 11.8% across Illinois and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Kirkland?
34 minutes each way on average, against 28 across Illinois and 26 nationally. 7% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Kirkland work?
3% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are DeKalb (7%, 12 mi), Rockford (7%, 16 mi), Elgin (5%, 27 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Kirkland walkable?
Kirkland is more walkable than 49% of U.S. towns (Walkability B−): an EPA walkability index of 7.2 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Kirkland 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 Kirkland, from the people who make the trip.
More of Kirkland
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.