Sterling Free Public Carnegie Library · Photo: Catboy69 · CC0Household incomes in Sterling are lower than in 81% of U.S. towns
Below the poverty line: 5.7% of residents, next to 11.3% for Kansas as a whole. Jobs and income earn Sterling B−; getting around on foot earns it A. About one in three work in Sterling itself; outside it, Hutchinson draws the most (10%, 19 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
How the Jobs & income grade adds up in Sterling
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Sterling is better than 49% of U.S. towns. Unemployment holds Sterling’s grade up (2.4%, U.S. 5.2%); household income pulls it down ($54,922, U.S. $80,734). It also does well on the poverty rate.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Sterling could be anywhere from C to B.
The workday shuffle in and out of Sterling
On a workday 603 residents head out to work, 294 work right here, and 927 people come in from elsewhere.
About 2,600 people are in Sterling on a workday afternoon, 14% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.36 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 people from Sterling work
Where Sterling clocks in
10% of workers
7% 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: 30% of the jobs in Sterling
1,221 jobs are based in Sterling.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Sterling, 2013 → 2023: 1,091 → 1,221. 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 Sterling’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Getting to work from Sterling takes about 21 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.7 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Sterling workers work from home, vs 12% across Kansas. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,042 commuters (the 8% who work from home are left out). Across Kansas: 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.
Half of Sterling commutes less than 12 miles
About 25% 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.
Good to walk, short on transit: Sterling
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Sterling is more walkable than 92% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 14.5% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 3.4% across Kansas, on an EPA index of 8.9.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 1,131 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). 4.1% of Sterling households have no vehicle (Kansas 5.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Sterling’s commuters take a bus or train.
Out of 5,328 U.S. towns of 1,600 to 3,100, Sterling comes 2,331st on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kenilworth IL | 2,437 | $250K | 2.1% | 4.0% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 39 | Oxford Township KS | 2,058 | $163K | 1.9% | 2.1% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 62 | Westwood KS | 1,720 | $118K | 1.9% | 2.4% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 66 | Ohio Township KS | 2,219 | $158K | 0.6% | 0.6% | 4% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 2,329 | Hanapepe HI | 2,638 | $100K | 3.2% | 6.7% | 6% | B− |
| 2,330 | Farmer City IL | 1,797 | $67K | 8.2% | 9.2% | 16% | B− |
| 2,331 | Sterling KS | 2,303 | $55K | 5.7% | 2.4% | 33% | B− |
| 2,332 | Patton Village TX | 2,069 | $78K | 21.5% | 7.4% | <1% | B− |
| 2,333 | Warsaw VA | 1,692 | $85K | 6.5% | 1.4% | 13% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 5,328 | Lame Deer MT | 1,872 | $24K | 55.8% | 42.2% | 60% | 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 Sterling, the top three, the last and three more from Kansas.
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 Sterling: questions
What is the median household income in Sterling?
$54,922 (±$4,210) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $74,275 across Kansas and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Sterling?
5.7%, against 11.3% across Kansas and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Sterling?
21 minutes each way on average, against 20 across Kansas and 26 nationally. 8% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Sterling work?
33% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Hutchinson (10%, 19 mi), Lyons (9%, 10 mi), Wichita (7%, 59 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Sterling walkable?
Sterling is more walkable than 92% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 8.9 out of 20, and 15% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Sterling 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 Sterling, from the people who make the trip.
More of Sterling
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.