Photo: Chris Flook · CC BY-SA 4.0Hagerstown’s household incomes are lower than in 79% of U.S. towns
Jobs & income C: better than 29% of U.S. towns on income, poverty and job access.
Walkability B: more walkable than 57% of U.S. towns.
Working residents average 26 minutes each way (Indiana 24, U.S. 26). About one in five work in Hagerstown; the top destination outside it is Richmond (21%, 15 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The short version on getting to work from Hagerstown
What’s behind Hagerstown’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Hagerstown is better than 29% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Hagerstown’s grade up (10.7%, U.S. 12.5%); household income pulls it down ($56,484, U.S. $80,734).
Unemployment (3.9%) is left out: Hagerstown’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, Hagerstown could be anywhere from C− to B−.
Hagerstown makes things: 44% of its jobs are in goods
793 jobs are based in Hagerstown. Here is what they are, next to the jobs Hagerstown’s own residents hold wherever they work.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Hagerstown, 2013 → 2023: 754 → 793. 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.
Who leaves, who stays, who comes in
On a workday 662 residents head out to work, 142 work right here, and 651 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 (0.99 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.
21% of working residents work in Richmond
A thicker line means more commuters. Switch between where residents work and where the people who work here live.
Where Hagerstown clocks in
7% of workers
3% of workersLines run between town centers. The top 10 towns each way; “Everywhere else” is the rest, including other states.
About 26 minutes each way, longer than most of Indiana
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Hagerstown workers work from home, vs 11% across Indiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 679 commuters (the 4% who work from home are left out). Across Indiana: 85% drive alone, 1% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
Half of Hagerstown commutes less than 15 miles
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
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.
Most trips from Hagerstown start in a car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Hagerstown is more walkable than 57% of U.S. towns. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 1.9% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 3.3% across Indiana.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 710 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). 3.8% of Hagerstown households have no vehicle (Indiana 6.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Hagerstown’s commuters take a bus or train.
Hagerstown is 3,477th of 5,760 U.S. towns of 1,200 to 2,300 on jobs and income
Ranked on the Jobs & income grade: the towns either side of Hagerstown, the top three, the last and three more from Indiana.
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Plandome NY | 1,482 | $250K | 0.9% | 1.4% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Hewlett Harbor NY | 1,332 | $250K | 1.9% | 7.2% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 6 | Meridian Hills IN | 1,800 | $212K | 0.8% | 3.6% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 112 | Galena IN | 1,549 | $128K | 1.8% | 4.8% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 164 | Foxcliff Estates IN | 1,674 | $142K | 2.8% | 0.0% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,475 | Central TN | 1,938 | $37K | 11.7% | 5.1% | 1% | C |
| 3,476 | South Whitley IN | 1,850 | $58K | 13.8% | 4.4% | 7% | C |
| 3,477 | Hagerstown IN | 1,673 | $56K | 10.7% | 3.9% | 18% | C |
| 3,478 | Carlin NV | 2,011 | $61K | 6.5% | 1.6% | 20% | C |
| 3,479 | Lake Waccamaw NC | 1,239 | $73K | 9.3% | 4.0% | 7% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 5,760 | 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.
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 Hagerstown: questions
What is the median household income in Hagerstown?
$56,484 (±$6,897) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $71,957 across Indiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Hagerstown?
10.7%, against 12.3% across Indiana and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Hagerstown?
26 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Indiana and 26 nationally. 4% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Hagerstown work?
18% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Richmond (21%, 15 mi), Indianapolis (7%, 53 mi), New Castle (3%, 11 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Hagerstown walkable?
Hagerstown is more walkable than 57% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 7.9 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Hagerstown without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 4% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Hagerstown, from the people who make the trip.
More of Hagerstown
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.