Photo: Brian Stansberry · CC BY 4.0Households in Bernie have lower incomes than those in 90% of U.S. towns
24.1% of residents are in poverty, next to 12.6% for Missouri as a whole. For jobs and income Bernie is better than 6% of U.S. towns (D); for walkability it is more walkable than 55% of U.S. towns (B). 1% of workers have no commute at all (Missouri 13%).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Where Bernie stands out on work
How the Jobs & income grade adds up in Bernie
All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Bernie’s grade.
Unemployment (2.7%) is left out: Bernie’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, Bernie could be anywhere from D− to D.
Time on the road from Bernie: about 21 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.8 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Bernie workers work from home, vs 13% across Missouri. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 583 commuters (the 1% who work from home are left out). Across Missouri: 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.
Bernie quiets down on a workday
On a workday 622 residents head out to work, 70 work right here, and 314 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,500 people are in Bernie on a workday afternoon, 17% fewer than live here.
0.55 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.
15% of working residents work in Dexter
Where Bernie clocks in
15% 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 Bernie’s employers do
384 jobs are based in Bernie.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Bernie, 2013 → 2023: 408 → 384. 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 Bernie’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far Bernie’s workers travel
About 22% 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 Bernie, most people drive to work
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 1.5% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 3.2% across Missouri.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 591 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). 3.0% of Bernie households have no vehicle (Missouri 6.6%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Bernie’s commuters take a bus or train.
U.S. towns of 1,300 to 2,500, and where Bernie sits
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kenilworth IL | 2,437 | $250K | 2.1% | 4.0% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Plandome NY | 1,482 | $250K | 0.9% | 1.4% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 16 | Warson Woods MO | 1,990 | $207K | 1.3% | 1.8% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 55 | Weatherby Lake MO | 2,139 | $153K | 3.4% | 1.4% | 1% | A+ |
| 56 | Lake Winnebago MO | 1,869 | $179K | 1.0% | 0.0% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 5,121 | Oak Grove LA | 1,350 | $51K | 16.8% | 2.2% | 31% | D |
| 5,122 | Crosby MN | 2,330 | $42K | 16.9% | 5.3% | 13% | D |
| 5,123 | Bernie MO | 1,828 | $48K | 24.1% | 2.7% | 10% | D |
| 5,124 | Peebles OH | 1,777 | $63K | 24.2% | 14.4% | 8% | D |
| 5,125 | Panama OK | 1,314 | $47K | 29.0% | 6.2% | 2% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 5,656 | 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 Bernie, the top three, the last and three more from Missouri.
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 Bernie: questions
What is the median household income in Bernie?
$48,438 (±$7,907) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $70,702 across Missouri and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Bernie?
24.1%, against 12.6% across Missouri and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Bernie?
21 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Missouri and 26 nationally. 1% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Bernie work?
10% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Dexter (15%, 8 mi), Liberty Township (8%, 4 mi), Poplar Bluff (4%, 25 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Bernie walkable?
Bernie is more walkable than 55% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 8.1 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Bernie without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 3% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Bernie, from the people who make the trip.
More of Bernie
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.