Weston Bluff Skirmish Site · Photo: Nyttend · Public domainSturgis’ household incomes are lower than in 97% of U.S. towns
2% of workers have no commute at all, where Kentucky as a whole has 10%. The poverty rate is 16.4% (Kentucky 16.1%). For jobs and income Sturgis is better than 5% of U.S. towns (D); for walkability it is more walkable than 36% of U.S. towns (C+).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
What sets Sturgis apart on work
How Sturgis earns its Jobs & income grade
The poverty rate holds Sturgis’ grade up; household income pulls it down ($36,780, U.S. $80,734).
Unemployment (4.0%) is left out: Sturgis’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, Sturgis could be anywhere from D− to D.
Jobs in Sturgis: what the 221 are
221 jobs are based in Sturgis.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Sturgis, 2013 → 2023: 516 → 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 Sturgis’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The daily flow of workers through Sturgis
On a workday 668 residents head out to work, 28 work right here, and 193 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,200 people are in Sturgis on a workday afternoon, 29% fewer than live here.
0.32 jobs for every working resident, so most people commute out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
16% of working residents work in Morganfield
Where Sturgis clocks in
16% of workers
7% of workers
4% 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 commute of about 22 minutes in Sturgis
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.2 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Sturgis workers work from home, vs 10% across Kentucky. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 693 commuters (the 2% 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.
Near or far: the trip to work from Sturgis
About 24% 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.
Getting around Sturgis: mostly by car
How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 2.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 3.1% across Kentucky, on an EPA index of 5.2.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 708 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). 9.3% of Sturgis households have no vehicle (Kentucky 6.8%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Sturgis’ commuters take a bus or train.
Out of 6,161 U.S. towns of 1,100 to 2,200, Sturgis comes 5,544th on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 41 | Pewee Valley KY | 1,668 | $157K | 3.0% | 2.7% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 68 | Audubon Park KY | 1,457 | $101K | 1.6% | 1.3% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 107 | Coldstream KY | 1,325 | $109K | 2.8% | 0.8% | <1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 5,542 | Elba Township MI | 1,275 | $52K | 17.0% | 4.7% | 3% | D |
| 5,543 | Archer FL | 1,159 | $41K | 38.1% | 7.0% | 1% | D |
| 5,544 | Sturgis KY | 1,637 | $37K | 16.4% | 4.0% | 4% | D |
| 5,545 | Calhoun City MS | 1,459 | $40K | 15.7% | 6.2% | 9% | D |
| 5,546 | Morrisville NY | 1,795 | $50K | 19.6% | 7.2% | 8% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 6,161 | 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.
Ranked on the Jobs & income grade: the towns either side of Sturgis, 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 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 Sturgis: questions
What is the median household income in Sturgis?
$36,780 (±$12,654) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $63,726 across Kentucky and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Sturgis?
16.4%, against 16.1% across Kentucky and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Sturgis?
22 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Kentucky and 26 nationally. 2% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Sturgis work?
4% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Morganfield (16%, 12 mi), Henderson (7%, 30 mi), Evansville (4%, 39 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Sturgis walkable?
Sturgis is more walkable than 36% of U.S. towns (Walkability C+): an EPA walkability index of 5.2 out of 20, and 3% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Sturgis without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 9% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Sturgis, from the people who make the trip.
More of Sturgis
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.