Photo: Fredlyfish4 · CC BY-SA 4.0Household incomes in Bruce are among the lowest of any U.S. town
Household incomes here are among the lowest in the country. 31.1% of residents are in poverty; Mississippi has 18.9%. For jobs and income Bruce is near the bottom of U.S. towns (D−); for walkability it is more walkable than 14% of U.S. towns (D).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The commute and the jobs: Bruce in brief
Bruce is where the jobs are
Bruce has 815 jobs, 1.5 for every working resident. Day and night ↓
Bruce’s biggest commute is a long one
The top workplace outside Bruce is Oxford, 27 miles away as the crow flies. 12% of working residents (64) make that trip; no town closer to home draws more of them. How far ↓
Fewer than half of Bruce workers earn over $40,000 a year
38% of Bruce’s working residents earn over $3,333 a month (about $40,000 a year) at their main job, wherever they work, and 17% earn $1,250 a month or less. The jobs ↓
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 538 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Inside Bruce’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Bruce is near the bottom of U.S. towns. All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Bruce’s grade.
Unemployment (3.2%) is left out: Bruce’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A firm grade. At either end of the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Bruce stays D−.
How a workday changes Bruce
On a workday 462 residents head out to work, 76 work right here, and 739 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,900 people are in Bruce on a workday afternoon, 17% more than live here.
1.5 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.
Half of Bruce commutes less than 29 miles
About 29% 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.
Bruce works in goods: 45% of its jobs
815 jobs are based in Bruce.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Bruce, 2013 → 2023: 689 → 815. 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 Bruce’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The towns that send workers to Bruce
Where Bruce clocks in
12% of workers
4% 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.
About 25 minutes each way for Bruce’s commuters
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Bruce workers work from home, vs 6% across Mississippi. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 506 commuters (the 6% who work from home are left out). Across Mississippi: 87% 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.
In Bruce, most people drive to work
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 1.8% across Mississippi.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 536 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). 18.0% of Bruce households have no vehicle (Mississippi 6.3%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Bruce’s commuters take a bus or train.
Bruce next to U.S. towns of 1,100 to 2,200
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,819 | Lynchburg MS | 2,161 | $89K | 7.1% | 10.2% | <1% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 1,837 | DeLisle MS | 1,906 | $72K | 7.2% | 3.9% | 4% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 2,151 | Arnold Line MS | 1,859 | $54K | 16.0% | 0.0% | <1% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 6,002 | Jackson KY | 2,054 | $33K | 27.1% | 12.3% | 35% | D− |
| 6,003 | Drew MS | 1,658 | $24K | 34.6% | 13.7% | 3% | D− |
| 6,004 | Bruce MS | 1,608 | $27K | 31.1% | 3.2% | 14% | D− |
| 6,005 | Estill SC | 1,778 | $36K | 24.4% | 6.4% | 6% | D− |
| 6,006 | Blackville SC | 1,925 | $22K | 32.9% | 1.5% | 6% | D− |
| … | |||||||
| 6,161 | 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 Bruce, the top three, the last and three more from Mississippi.
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 Bruce: questions
What is the median household income in Bruce?
$26,923 (±$11,471) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $56,447 across Mississippi and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Bruce?
31.1%, against 18.9% across Mississippi and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Bruce?
25 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Mississippi and 26 nationally. 6% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Bruce work?
14% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Oxford (12%, 27 mi), Jackson (4%, 126 mi), Pontotoc (3%, 26 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Bruce walkable?
Bruce is more walkable than 14% of U.S. towns (Walkability D): an EPA walkability index of 6.0 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Bruce without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 18% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Bruce, from the people who make the trip.
More of Bruce
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.