Park Mary Historic District · Photo: Nyttend · Public domainA job hub: Lafayette has 1.8 jobs per working resident, and 42,922 people come in to work
Lafayette has 59,682 jobs, and 32,709 of its residents work somewhere. For jobs and income Lafayette is better than 38% of U.S. towns (C+); for walkability it is more walkable than 90% of U.S. towns (A). Measured by household income, Lafayette is behind 83% of U.S. towns.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Where Lafayette stands out on work
Lafayette is where the jobs are
Lafayette has 59,682 jobs, 1.8 for every working resident. Day and night ↓
Commutes from Lafayette are quick
The average trip to work takes 16 minutes, against 24 across Indiana. That’s about 61 hours a year less on the road than the typical Indiana worker. 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.
How Lafayette earns its Jobs & income grade
Job access by car holds Lafayette’s grade up (ahead of 71% of U.S. towns); household income pulls it down ($53,716, U.S. $80,734). It also does well on unemployment.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Lafayette could be anywhere from C to B−.
How a workday changes Lafayette
On a workday 15,949 residents head out to work and 16,760 work right here.
About 98,000 people are in Lafayette on a workday afternoon, 38% more 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.
Each way, about 16 minutes from Lafayette
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 5.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Lafayette workers work from home, vs 11% across Indiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 32,437 commuters (the 8% 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.
Where Lafayette’s workforce comes from
Where Lafayette clocks in
13% of workers
7% of workers
2% 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.
Making and building: 34% of jobs based in Lafayette
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Lafayette, 2013 → 2023: 50,348 → 59,682. 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 Lafayette’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far Lafayette 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.
In Lafayette, walking beats the bus
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 4.6% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, above 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 35,239 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 99% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 58% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 7.8 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 91% 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). 11.0% of Lafayette households have no vehicle (Indiana 6.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 2% of Lafayette’s commuters take a bus or train.
Ranked on jobs and income, Lafayette is 498th among 619 U.S. towns of 50,000 to 96,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lakeville MN | 79,270 | $139K | 2.9% | 2.0% | 11% | A+ |
| 2 | Fulshear TX | 64,630 | $187K | 1.6% | 2.8% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Plymouth MN | 78,942 | $137K | 4.3% | 2.3% | 12% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 7 | Fall Creek Township IN | 75,188 | $146K | 3.2% | 2.4% | 9% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 15 | Westfield IN | 66,258 | $123K | 3.6% | 2.8% | 10% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 25 | Westfield Washington Township IN | 70,020 | $121K | 4.4% | 2.8% | 11% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 496 | Gastonia NC | 87,067 | $64K | 16.3% | 5.7% | 23% | C+ |
| 497 | Kenner LA | 65,136 | $64K | 15.4% | 6.6% | 16% | C+ |
| 498 | Lafayette IN | 71,238 | $54K | 17.8% | 3.6% | 51% | C+ |
| 499 | Dundalk MD | 65,969 | $65K | 17.4% | 6.9% | 7% | C+ |
| 500 | Bloom Township IL | 83,631 | $74K | 17.8% | 11.0% | 11% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 619 | Albany GA | 66,907 | $47K | 27.5% | 11.2% | 51% | 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 Lafayette, the top three, the last and three more from Indiana.
How Lafayette compares with the towns next door
Average commute minutes, one way
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Lafayette workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lafayette | – | C+ | A | 16 min | $53,716 |
| Shadeland | under 1% | B− | D | 17 min | $82,708 |
| Union Township | under 1% | B− | D | 17 min | $82,708 |
| Wea Township | under 1% | B | B− | 18 min | $69,142 |
| Fairfield Township | under 1% | C+ | A | 17 min | $54,354 |
| Dayton | under 1% | B | D− | 18 min | $78,289 |
Same-state neighbors only. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Lafayette’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 Lafayette: questions
What is the median household income in Lafayette?
$53,716 (±$2,765) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $71,957 across Indiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Lafayette?
17.8%, against 12.3% across Indiana and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Lafayette?
16 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Indiana and 26 nationally. 8% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Lafayette work?
51% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are West Lafayette (13%, 4 mi), Indianapolis (7%, 57 mi), Frankfort (2%, 19 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Lafayette walkable?
Lafayette is more walkable than 90% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 13.4 out of 20, and 5% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Lafayette without a car?
2% of commuters take transit and 11% of households have no car. 58% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Lafayette, from the people who make the trip.
More of Lafayette
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.