Photo: MrHarman · CC BY 3.0Households in La Porte have lower incomes than those in 75% of U.S. towns
La Porte grades C+ for jobs and income and B for walkability. Poverty touches 16.4% of residents; Indiana has 12.3%. About one in three stay in La Porte for work; outside it, Michigan City is the main destination (10%, 10 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Income, poverty and work: La Porte’s grade explained
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, La Porte is better than 40% of U.S. towns, #409 of 593 in Indiana. Job access by car holds La Porte’s grade up (ahead of 62% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down. It also does well on unemployment.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, La Porte could be anywhere from C to B.
How a workday changes La Porte
On a workday 6,331 residents head out to work, 2,893 work right here, and 8,969 people come in from elsewhere.
About 25,000 people are in La Porte on a workday afternoon, 12% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.29 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.
Where La Porte goes to work
Where La Porte clocks in
4% of workers
3% 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.
A place that makes things: 32% of La Porte’s jobs are in goods
11,862 jobs are based in La Porte.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in La Porte, 2013 → 2023: 11,756 → 11,862. 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 La Porte’s own residents hold wherever they work.
About 24 minutes to work from La Porte
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.6 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of La Porte workers work from home, vs 11% across Indiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 9,689 commuters (the 5% 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.
Short hops and long hauls from La Porte
About 17% 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.
La Porte is a driving town
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, La Porte is more walkable than 62% of U.S. towns, #171 of 593 in Indiana. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 2.2% 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 10,156 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 0% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about under 0.1 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 20% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 7.9% of La Porte households have no vehicle (Indiana 6.2%, U.S. 8.4%). <1% of La Porte’s commuters take a bus or train.
For jobs and income, La Porte is 1,292nd of 1,712 U.S. towns of 16,000 to 31,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Springfield VA | 22,532 | $163K | 1.9% | 1.7% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Mountain Brook AL | 21,661 | $201K | 3.2% | 1.2% | 8% | A+ |
| 3 | Lake Forest IL | 19,731 | $235K | 3.5% | 1.8% | 12% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 31 | St. John IN | 24,841 | $131K | 2.1% | 2.3% | 8% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 116 | Vernon Township IN | 20,047 | $108K | 1.9% | 2.7% | 7% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 225 | Sugar Creek Township IN | 18,299 | $101K | 5.6% | 2.0% | 7% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 1,290 | Marion IL | 17,148 | $57K | 13.3% | 3.5% | 40% | C+ |
| 1,291 | New Philadelphia OH | 17,424 | $59K | 15.9% | 3.7% | 20% | C+ |
| 1,292 | La Porte IN | 22,600 | $59K | 16.4% | 3.5% | 31% | C+ |
| 1,293 | Middletown NY | 30,098 | $79K | 13.6% | 6.6% | 11% | C+ |
| 1,294 | Huntington Township IN | 20,559 | $60K | 13.0% | 4.0% | 35% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,712 | Douglas AZ | 16,038 | $42K | 27.8% | 12.3% | 29% | 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 La Porte, 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 La Porte: questions
What is the median household income in La Porte?
$59,307 (±$4,906) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $71,957 across Indiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in La Porte?
16.4%, against 12.3% across Indiana and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from La Porte?
24 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Indiana and 26 nationally. 5% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in La Porte work?
31% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Michigan City (10%, 10 mi), South Bend (4%, 24 mi), Indianapolis (3%, 130 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is La Porte walkable?
La Porte is more walkable than 62% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 8.0 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around La Porte without a car?
<1% of commuters take transit and 8% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from La Porte, from the people who make the trip.
More of La Porte
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.