Photo: Sinneed · CC BY-SA 3.0Oak Grove has 2.6 jobs for every working resident: 1,149 people commute in to work
Oak Grove has 1,301 jobs; 496 of its residents have a job. The two grades for Oak Grove are D for jobs and income and B− for walkability. Measured by household income, Oak Grove is behind 87% of U.S. towns.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Oak Grove and work: the main findings
Oak Grove is where the jobs are
Oak Grove has 1,301 jobs, 2.6 for every working resident. On a workday afternoon about 2,200 people are in town, 60% more than the 1,400 who live here. Day and night ↓
A big share show a job far from home
32% 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 ↓
Commutes from Oak Grove are quick
The average trip to work takes 20 minutes, against 26 across Louisiana. That’s about 46 hours a year less on the road than the typical Louisiana 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; with 496 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Breaking down the Jobs & income grade for Oak Grove
On income, poverty and job access, Oak Grove is better than 6% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Oak Grove’s grade up (16.8%, U.S. 12.5%); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 7% of U.S. towns).
Unemployment (2.2%) is left out: Oak Grove’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, Oak Grove could be anywhere from D− to C−.
Oak Grove by day and by night
On a workday 344 residents head out to work and 152 work right here.
About 2,200 people are in Oak Grove on a workday afternoon, 60% 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.
The distance from Oak Grove to work
About 32% 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.
About 20 minutes each way, quicker than most of Louisiana
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Oak Grove workers work from home, vs 8% across Louisiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 597 commuters (the 6% who work from home are left out). Across Louisiana: 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 Oak Grove’s workers come from
Where Oak Grove clocks in
6% 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.
The kinds of work in Oak Grove
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Oak Grove, 2013 → 2023: 1,638 → 1,301. 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 Oak Grove’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Most of Oak Grove commutes by car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Oak Grove is more walkable than 55% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 4.5% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 3.3% across Louisiana, on an EPA index of 5.9.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 636 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). 13.4% of Oak Grove households have no vehicle (Louisiana 8.4%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Oak Grove’s commuters take a bus or train.
Oak Grove places 4,821st of 5,400 on jobs and income among U.S. towns of 900 to 1,800
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Baxter Estates NY | 1,014 | $154K | 1.0% | 3.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 314 | Paulina LA | 1,785 | $89K | 2.1% | 0.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 490 | Sorrento LA | 1,622 | $118K | 8.5% | 3.2% | 1% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 513 | Cade LA | 1,710 | $73K | 6.0% | 1.5% | 2% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 4,819 | Falcon Lake Estates TX | 1,075 | $66K | 33.0% | 3.3% | 6% | D |
| 4,820 | Carrier Mills IL | 1,595 | $51K | 25.4% | 6.0% | 3% | D |
| 4,821 | Oak Grove LA | 1,350 | $51K | 16.8% | 2.2% | 31% | D |
| 4,822 | Maysville MO | 1,071 | $44K | 18.4% | 2.2% | 16% | D |
| 4,823 | Leadwood MO | 1,158 | $45K | 36.0% | 2.7% | 1% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 5,400 | Oglala SD | 1,071 | $21K | 68.8% | 26.5% | 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 Oak Grove, the top three, the last and three more from Louisiana.
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 Oak Grove: questions
What is the median household income in Oak Grove?
$51,136 (±$19,477) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $60,756 across Louisiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Oak Grove?
16.8%, against 18.9% across Louisiana and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Oak Grove?
20 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Louisiana and 26 nationally. 6% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Oak Grove work?
31% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Monroe (6%, 46 mi), Eudora (3%, 19 mi), Bastrop (2%, 31 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Oak Grove walkable?
Oak Grove is more walkable than 55% of U.S. towns (Walkability B−): an EPA walkability index of 5.9 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Oak Grove without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 13% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Oak Grove, from the people who make the trip.
More of Oak Grove
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.