Photo: Brian Stansberry · CC BY 4.0Few U.S. towns have household incomes as low as Beattyville’s
Measured by household income, Beattyville is among the lowest-earning towns in the country. 42.2% of residents live below the poverty line; Kentucky has 16.1%. The two grades for Beattyville are D− for jobs and income and C for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Getting to work from Beattyville, in brief
Beattyville is where the jobs are
Beattyville has 1,302 jobs, 2.9 for every working resident. On a workday afternoon about 3,000 people are in town, 41% more than the 2,100 who live here. Day and night ↓
A big share show a job far from home
33% of working residents have a main job more than 50 miles away. Part of that is employers that report every worker at one head office, so not all of those trips happen daily. How far ↓
Nearly all the work in Beattyville is services
85% of the jobs based here are in services, such as health care, schools and offices. Only 7% are in factories, building or farms. The jobs ↓
Written from the Census figures on this page. Commute flows, distances and jobs are Census LEHD 2024, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey; with 444 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Beattyville
On income, poverty and job access, Beattyville is near the bottom of U.S. towns. All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Beattyville’s grade.
Unemployment (14.5%) is left out: Beattyville’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A firm grade. At either end of the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Beattyville stays D−.
A workday in Beattyville: who goes, who stays, who comes
On a workday 330 residents head out to work, 114 work right here, and 1,188 people come in from elsewhere.
About 3,000 people are in Beattyville on a workday afternoon, 41% more than live here.
2.9 jobs for every working resident, so more people commute in than out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2024, primary jobs.
Short hops and long hauls from Beattyville
About 33% 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 2024.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
Beattyville is a services town
1,302 jobs are based in Beattyville.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Beattyville, 2014 → 2024: 1,048 → 1,302. 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 2024.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Beattyville’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Commuting in to Beattyville: where workers come from
Where Beattyville clocks in
3% 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.
About 27 minutes to work from Beattyville
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.6 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Beattyville workers work from home, vs 10% across Kentucky. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 275 commuters (the 5% who work from home are left out). Across Kentucky: 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.
Most of Beattyville commutes by car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Beattyville is more walkable than 31% of U.S. towns. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 3.1% across Kentucky.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 290 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). 23.7% of Beattyville households have no vehicle (Kentucky 6.8%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Beattyville’s commuters take a bus or train.
Beattyville next to U.S. towns of 1,500 to 2,900
| # | 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% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 15 | Lakeside Park KY | 2,847 | $129K | 1.5% | 0.0% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 25 | Pewee Valley KY | 1,668 | $157K | 3.0% | 2.7% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 102 | Windy Hills KY | 2,476 | $131K | 5.1% | 1.9% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 5,385 | Buena Vista GA | 1,583 | $29K | 35.9% | 1.9% | 18% | D− |
| 5,386 | Butler GA | 1,825 | $22K | 49.6% | 2.0% | 16% | D− |
| 5,387 | Beattyville KY | 2,114 | $23K | 42.2% | 14.5% | 26% | D− |
| 5,388 | Zwolle LA | 1,605 | $28K | 42.0% | 9.7% | 10% | D− |
| 5,389 | Piedmont MO | 1,862 | $40K | 49.0% | 8.2% | 20% | D− |
| … | |||||||
| 5,404 | Lame Deer MT | 1,872 | $24K | 55.8% | 42.2% | 61% | 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 Beattyville, the top three, the last and three more from Kentucky.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2024, 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 Beattyville: questions
What is the median household income in Beattyville?
$22,880 (±$7,303) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $63,726 across Kentucky and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Beattyville?
42.2%, against 16.1% across Kentucky and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Beattyville?
27 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Kentucky and 26 nationally. 5% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Beattyville work?
26% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Lexington (6%, 52 mi), Jackson (3%, 18 mi), Prestonsburg (2%, 52 mi) (Census LEHD 2024).
Is Beattyville walkable?
Beattyville is more walkable than 31% of U.S. towns (Walkability C): an EPA walkability index of 7.8 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Beattyville without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 24% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Beattyville, from the people who make the trip.
More of Beattyville
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2024, 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.