Dawson Carnegie Library · Photo: McGhiever · CC BY-SA 3.0Jobs, income and commuting in Dawson, MN
5% of workers work from home, against 18% across Minnesota. Dawson grades C for jobs and income and A for walkability. About one in four stay in Dawson for work; outside it, Montevideo is the main destination (12%, 16 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Dawson: the figures worth knowing
Inside Dawson’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Dawson is better than 32% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Dawson’s grade up (7.6%, U.S. 12.5%); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 10% of U.S. towns).
Unemployment (2.5%) is left out: Dawson’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, Dawson could be anywhere from C− to B−.
About 13 minutes to work from Dawson
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Dawson workers work from home, vs 18% across Minnesota. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 736 commuters (the 5% who work from home are left out). Across Minnesota: 84% drive alone, 2% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
The daily flow of workers through Dawson
On a workday 419 residents head out to work, 171 work right here, and 568 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,600 people are in Dawson on a workday afternoon, 10% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.25 per resident).
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 Dawson’s working residents head each day
Where Dawson clocks in
5% 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 739 jobs based in Dawson
739 jobs are based in Dawson.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Dawson, 2013 → 2023: 845 → 739. 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 Dawson’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Miles to work from Dawson
About 28% 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.
In Dawson, walking beats the bus
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Dawson is more walkable than 89% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 10.2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 5.7% across Minnesota, on an EPA index of 8.5.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 772 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). 6.2% of Dawson households have no vehicle (Minnesota 6.7%, U.S. 8.4%). <1% of Dawson’s commuters take a bus or train.
3,160th of 5,877: where Dawson ranks among U.S. towns of 1,000 to 1,900
| # | 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 9 | Medicine Lake MN | 1,342 | $184K | 2.7% | 0.0% | 0% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 33 | Dellwood MN | 1,148 | $225K | 4.1% | 0.9% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 35 | Louisville Township MN | 1,361 | $143K | 1.1% | 0.9% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,158 | Luna Pier MI | 1,351 | $62K | 26.0% | 3.8% | 2% | C |
| 3,159 | Watkins MN | 1,018 | $65K | 11.4% | 4.0% | 4% | C |
| 3,160 | Dawson MN | 1,444 | $69K | 7.6% | 2.5% | 29% | C |
| 3,161 | China TX | 1,343 | $55K | 11.8% | 9.4% | 1% | C |
| 3,162 | Windsor Township IL | 1,343 | $70K | 11.3% | 2.7% | 6% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 5,877 | 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 Dawson, the top three, the last and three more from Minnesota.
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 Dawson: questions
What is the median household income in Dawson?
$68,929 (±$10,378) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $89,062 across Minnesota and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Dawson?
7.6%, against 9.3% across Minnesota and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Dawson?
13 minutes each way on average, against 23 across Minnesota and 26 nationally. 5% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Dawson work?
29% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Montevideo (12%, 16 mi), Madison (5%, 9 mi), Marshall (3%, 36 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Dawson walkable?
Dawson is more walkable than 89% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 8.5 out of 20, and 10% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Dawson without a car?
<1% of commuters take transit and 6% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Dawson, from the people who make the trip.
More of Dawson
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.