Photo: Quintin Soloviev · CC BY 4.0Ruston has lower family incomes than 96% of U.S. towns
For jobs and income Ruston is better than 11% of U.S. towns (D); for walkability it is more walkable than 79% of U.S. towns (A−). Not counting college students, poverty touches 31.9% of residents; Louisiana has 18.2%. About two in five work in Ruston; the top destination outside it is Monroe (7%, 32 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
What sets Ruston apart on work
Commutes from Ruston are quick
The average trip to work takes 15 minutes, against 26 across Louisiana. That’s about 84 hours a year less on the road than the typical Louisiana worker. Time on the road ↓
Ruston is where the jobs are
Ruston has 13,465 jobs, 1.8 for every working resident. Day and night ↓
Ruston draws workers from far and wide
The 13,465 jobs in Ruston are filled from a wide area. Ruston’s own residents hold 23% and the ten next-biggest home towns 15%; the other 62% come from many towns beyond those. The commute map ↓
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.
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Ruston
Job access by car holds Ruston’s grade up (ahead of 53% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down.
30% of Ruston’s residents are college students, and off-campus students count in the Census poverty figures. Where students are 15% or more of the people the Census checks for poverty (23% here), the grade uses the rate without them: 31.9%, against 39.8% for all residents. Unemployment (3.4%) is left out here: students looking for part-time work count as unemployed. Income is ranked as median family income ($51,161), since student households pull the household median down ($31,120).
A firm grade. At either end of the Census margins of error for family income and poverty, Ruston stays D.
The daily trip from Ruston: about 15 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 4.8 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Ruston workers work from home, vs 8% across Louisiana. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 7,057 commuters (the 15% 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.
A workday in Ruston: who goes, who stays, who comes
On a workday 4,403 residents head out to work, 3,157 work right here, and 10,308 people come in from elsewhere.
About 28,000 people are in Ruston on a workday afternoon, 26% more than live here.
1.8 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 2023, primary jobs.
Where Ruston’s workers come from
Where Ruston clocks in
7% of workers
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.
What Ruston’s employers do
13,465 jobs are based in Ruston.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Ruston, 2013 → 2023: 12,634 → 13,465. 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 Ruston’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The commute from Ruston, by distance
About 27% 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.
Ruston is more walkable than most U.S. towns, with limited transit
How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 5.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 3.3% across Louisiana, on an EPA index of 7.8.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 8,289 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). 11.3% of Ruston households have no vehicle (Louisiana 8.4%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Ruston’s commuters take a bus or train.
Ruston next to U.S. towns of 16,000 to 30,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Springfield VA | 22,532 | $163K | 1.9% | 1.7% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Mountain Brook AL | 21,661 | $201K | 3.2% | 1.2% | 8% | A+ |
| 3 | Lake Forest IL | 19,731 | $235K | 3.5% | 1.8% | 12% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 378 | Youngsville LA | 19,980 | $106K | 9.1% | 1.2% | 8% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 1,049 | Zachary LA | 20,621 | $84K | 8.5% | 6.9% | 10% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 1,234 | Estelle LA | 16,341 | $79K | 17.0% | 7.8% | 2% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,618 | Dinuba CA | 25,949 | $59K | 26.8% | 10.6% | 19% | D |
| 1,619 | Monroe GA | 16,507 | $45K | 33.8% | 11.6% | 14% | D |
| 1,620 | Ruston LA | 22,397 | $31K | 39.8% | 3.4% | 42% | D |
| 1,621 | Albemarle NC | 17,769 | $47K | 24.9% | 5.6% | 24% | D |
| 1,622 | Coalinga CA | 17,281 | $75K | 21.7% | 11.4% | 36% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 1,658 | Douglas AZ | 16,038 | $42K | 27.8% | 12.3% | 29% | 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 Ruston, the top three, the last and three more from Louisiana.
The towns around Ruston
The biggest share goes to Grambling (3%).
Jobs & commute next door
Darker towns draw more of Ruston’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.
- Students. 30% of residents are college students; the poverty input leaves off-campus students out (above).
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Ruston: questions
What is the median household income in Ruston?
$31,120 (±$1,970) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $60,756 across Louisiana and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Ruston?
39.8% of residents live below the poverty line; leaving out college students, 31.9%. Louisiana: 18.9%.
How long is the commute from Ruston?
15 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Louisiana and 26 nationally. 15% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Ruston work?
42% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Monroe (7%, 32 mi), Shreveport (6%, 68 mi), Grambling (3%, 4 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Ruston walkable?
Ruston is more walkable than 79% of U.S. towns (Walkability A−): an EPA walkability index of 7.8 out of 20, and 6% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Ruston without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 11% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Ruston, from the people who make the trip.
More of Ruston
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.