Photo: Chris Flook · CC BY-SA 4.0Households in Geneva earn less than those in 85% of U.S. towns
For 1% of workers, the job is at home, next to 11% for Indiana as a whole. Below the poverty line: 21.5% of residents; Indiana has 12.3%. Jobs and income earn Geneva D; getting around on foot earns it C+.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
What sets Geneva apart on work
Geneva makes and builds things
73% of the jobs based in Geneva are in goods: factories, construction and farms. Across the jobs Geneva residents hold, wherever they work, it’s 34%. The jobs ↓
Geneva and Berne trade workers both ways
Berne is the top workplace for Geneva residents (24%) and also where the most people who work in Geneva come from (17% of its jobs). The commute map ↓
Few Geneva workers work from home
Only 1% of workers work from home, against 11% across Indiana. Almost everyone here travels to a job. Time on the road ↓
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 345 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
What’s behind Geneva’s Jobs & income grade
Job access by car holds Geneva’s grade up (ahead of 34% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down.
Unemployment (5.9%) is left out: Geneva’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, Geneva could be anywhere from D to C.
Geneva works in goods: 73% of its jobs
415 jobs are based in Geneva.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Geneva, 2013 → 2023: 270 → 415. 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 Geneva’s own residents hold wherever they work.
24% of working residents work in Berne
Where Geneva clocks in
24% of workers
8% 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.
Each way, about 22 minutes from Geneva
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Geneva workers work from home, vs 11% across Indiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 554 commuters (the 1% who work from home are left out). Across Indiana: 85% 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.
Who works in Geneva, and who works elsewhere
On a workday 335 residents head out to work, 10 work right here, and 405 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 (1.20 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.
Short hops and long hauls from Geneva
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.
Geneva is a driving town
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Geneva is more walkable than 42% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 3.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 3.3% across Indiana, on an EPA index of 5.0.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 558 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). 8.9% of Geneva households have no vehicle (Indiana 6.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Geneva’s commuters take a bus or train.
Geneva is 3,940th of 4,866 U.S. towns of 900 to 1,700 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 85 | Galena IN | 1,549 | $128K | 1.8% | 4.8% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 93 | Ogden Dunes IN | 1,163 | $117K | 3.9% | 2.6% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 123 | Foxcliff Estates IN | 1,674 | $142K | 2.8% | 0.0% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,938 | Tok AK | 1,649 | $64K | 14.5% | 5.8% | — | D |
| 3,939 | Rancho Alegre TX | 1,337 | $49K | 23.7% | 0.0% | 0% | D |
| 3,940 | Geneva IN | 1,293 | $53K | 21.5% | 5.9% | 3% | D |
| 3,941 | John Day OR | 1,634 | $58K | 12.9% | 6.9% | 36% | D |
| 3,942 | Guernsey WY | 1,104 | $50K | 10.1% | 8.9% | 25% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 4,866 | 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 Geneva, the top three, the last and three more from Indiana.
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 Geneva: questions
What is the median household income in Geneva?
$52,500 (±$11,641) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $71,957 across Indiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Geneva?
21.5%, against 12.3% across Indiana and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Geneva?
22 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Indiana and 26 nationally. 1% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Geneva work?
3% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Berne (24%, 4 mi), Decatur (8%, 16 mi), Indianapolis (8%, 84 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Geneva walkable?
Geneva is more walkable than 42% of U.S. towns (Walkability C+): an EPA walkability index of 5.0 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Geneva without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 9% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Geneva, from the people who make the trip.
More of Geneva
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.