Banner Elk Hotel · Photo: Nyttend · Public domainA job hub: Banner Elk has 2.8 jobs per working resident, and 924 people come in to work
32% of workers work from home, against 16% across North Carolina. 966 jobs are based in Banner Elk, and 351 of its residents work somewhere. Jobs and income earn Banner Elk C; getting around on foot earns it A.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Banner Elk and work: the main findings
Banner Elk is where the jobs are
Banner Elk has 966 jobs, 2.8 for every working resident. On a workday afternoon about 1,900 people are in town, 50% more than the 1,200 who live here. Day and night ↓
Commutes from Banner Elk are quick
The average trip to work takes 12 minutes, against 25 across North Carolina. That’s about 100 hours a year less on the road than the typical North Carolina worker. Time on the road ↓
A lot of Banner Elk works from home
32% of Banner Elk workers work from home, against 16% across North Carolina. Time on the road ↓
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 351 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
How the Jobs & income grade adds up in Banner Elk
On income, poverty and job access, Banner Elk is better than 29% of U.S. towns. Household income holds Banner Elk’s grade up ($86,382, U.S. $80,734); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 7% of U.S. towns).
Unemployment (2.4%) is left out: Banner Elk’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Banner Elk could be anywhere from D− to B+.
The daily flow of workers through Banner Elk
On a workday 309 residents head out to work and 42 work right here.
About 1,900 people are in Banner Elk on a workday afternoon, 50% more than live here.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
Getting to work from Banner Elk takes about 12 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 3.7 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Banner Elk workers work from home, vs 16% across North Carolina. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 331 commuters (the 31% who work from home are left out). Across North Carolina: 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.
Where the people who work in Banner Elk live
Where Banner Elk clocks in
11% of workers
4% of workers
4% 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 Banner Elk’s employers do
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Banner Elk, 2013 → 2023: 746 → 966. 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 Banner Elk’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Where in the region Banner Elk works
About 30% 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.
Banner Elk is easy on foot, hard by bus
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Banner Elk is more walkable than 89% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 12.1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 2.9% across North Carolina, on an EPA index of 8.3.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 483 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). 5.4% of Banner Elk households have no vehicle (North Carolina 5.3%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Banner Elk’s commuters take a bus or train.
Banner Elk is 2,814th of 4,866 U.S. towns of 900 to 1,700 on jobs and income
| # | 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 76 | Biltmore Forest NC | 1,469 | $169K | 2.0% | 2.5% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 285 | Montreat NC | 1,024 | $116K | 0.0% | 9.6% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 324 | Advance NC | 1,408 | $115K | 5.0% | 0.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 2,812 | Johnstonville CA | 1,039 | $100K | 15.9% | 14.6% | 2% | C |
| 2,813 | Akron IA | 1,531 | $66K | 9.5% | 1.7% | 18% | C |
| 2,814 | Banner Elk NC | 1,242 | $86K | 13.0% | 2.4% | 12% | C |
| 2,815 | Ferndale PA | 1,485 | $57K | 14.9% | 3.0% | 3% | C |
| 2,816 | South Carthage TN | 1,576 | $56K | 17.2% | 3.0% | 4% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 4,866 | 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 Banner Elk, the top three, the last and three more from North Carolina.
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 Banner Elk: questions
What is the median household income in Banner Elk?
$86,382 (±$37,063) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $72,388 across North Carolina and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Banner Elk?
13.0%, against 13.0% across North Carolina and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Banner Elk?
12 minutes each way on average, against 25 across North Carolina and 26 nationally. 32% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Banner Elk work?
12% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Boone (11%, 12 mi), Sugar Mountain (4%, 2 mi), Charlotte (4%, 88 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Banner Elk walkable?
Banner Elk is more walkable than 89% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 8.3 out of 20, and 12% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Banner Elk without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 5% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Banner Elk, from the people who make the trip.
More of Banner Elk
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.