Photo: Lonepointe · CC BY-SA 3.0At 6.7%, unemployment in Sparta is higher than in 80% of U.S. towns
Household incomes here are lower than in 73% of U.S. towns. The two grades for Sparta are C+ for jobs and income and B for walkability. About one in ten work in Sparta itself; outside it, Grand Rapids draws the most (20%, 14 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2021, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Sparta and work: the main findings
How Sparta earns its Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Sparta is better than 41% of U.S. towns, #477 of 701 in Michigan. Job access by car holds Sparta’s grade up (ahead of 75% of U.S. towns); unemployment pulls it down. It also does well on the poverty rate.
The commuting and job counts on this page are Census LEHD 2021: Michigan reports later than other states, so its newest year is two years behind.
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Sparta could be anywhere from C− to A−.
Goods jobs make up 54% of work in Sparta
2,564 jobs are based in Sparta.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Sparta, 2011 → 2021: 2,504 → 2,564. 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 2021.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Sparta’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Sparta by day and by night
On a workday 1,688 residents head out to work, 174 work right here, and 2,390 people come in from elsewhere.
About 5,000 people are in Sparta on a workday afternoon, 16% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.38 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2021, primary jobs.
The places Sparta commutes to
Where Sparta clocks in
12% 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 26 minutes in Sparta
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Sparta workers work from home, vs 14% across Michigan. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,677 commuters (the 17% who work from home are left out). Across Michigan: 86% 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.
Close to home or a long way: work trips from Sparta
About 15% 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 2021.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
In Sparta, the car does most of the work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Sparta is more walkable than 60% of U.S. towns, #190 of 701 in Michigan. Both inputs place Sparta near the same point nationally.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 2,011 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 0% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about under 0.1 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 20% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 9.1% of Sparta households have no vehicle (Michigan 7.0%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Sparta’s commuters take a bus or train.
Ranked on jobs and income, Sparta is 2,427th among 3,962 U.S. towns of 3,000 to 5,700
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Riverwoods IL | 3,766 | $249K | 0.7% | 0.7% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Mission Hills KS | 3,522 | $250K | 1.2% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Ho-Ho-Kus NJ | 4,313 | $250K | 0.0% | 1.7% | 6% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 25 | Franklin MI | 3,134 | $194K | 2.8% | 2.0% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 120 | Vergennes Township MI | 4,968 | $113K | 1.5% | 0.9% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 125 | Ann Arbor Township MI | 4,506 | $165K | 7.2% | 0.5% | 9% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 2,425 | Corinth ME | 3,139 | $64K | 11.4% | 1.9% | 11% | C+ |
| 2,426 | Arcadia Township MI | 3,174 | $80K | 11.0% | 4.0% | 3% | C+ |
| 2,427 | Sparta MI | 4,255 | $61K | 9.3% | 6.7% | 9% | C+ |
| 2,428 | Broadalbin NY | 5,077 | $75K | 12.9% | 3.8% | 8% | C+ |
| 2,429 | Aledo IL | 3,506 | $72K | 12.6% | 3.8% | 40% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,962 | Lake Isabella CA | 4,059 | $27K | 40.7% | 8.6% | 18% | 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 Sparta, the top three, the last and three more from Michigan.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2021, 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 Sparta: questions
What is the median household income in Sparta?
$60,728 (±$3,710) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $72,875 across Michigan and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Sparta?
9.3%, against 13.2% across Michigan and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Sparta?
26 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Michigan and 26 nationally. 17% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Sparta work?
9% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Grand Rapids (20%, 14 mi), Sparta Township (12%, 1 mi), Walker (8%, 11 mi) (Census LEHD 2021).
Is Sparta walkable?
Sparta is more walkable than 60% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 7.7 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Sparta without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 9% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Sparta, from the people who make the trip.
More of Sparta
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2021, 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.