Photo: NC Aquarium PKS · CC BY 3.0Households in Pine Knoll Shores have higher incomes than those in 83% of U.S. towns
3.5% of residents are in poverty (North Carolina 13.0%). Jobs and income earn Pine Knoll Shores B+; getting around on foot earns it B−. 26% of workers have no commute at all, against 16% across North Carolina.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Pine Knoll Shores: the figures worth knowing
A big share show a job far from home
40% of working residents have a main job more than 50 miles away. Part of that is employers that report every worker at one head office, so not all of those trips happen daily. How far ↓
Home offices are common in Pine Knoll Shores
26% of Pine Knoll Shores 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 2024, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey; with 405 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Income, poverty and work: Pine Knoll Shores’ grade explained
On income, poverty and job access, Pine Knoll Shores is better than 66% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Pine Knoll Shores’ grade up; job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 8% of U.S. towns). It also does well on household income.
Unemployment (3.8%) is left out: Pine Knoll Shores’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, Pine Knoll Shores could be anywhere from B to B+.
The distance from Pine Knoll Shores to work
About 40% 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 2024.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
About 26 minutes to work from Pine Knoll Shores
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.3 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Pine Knoll Shores workers work from home, vs 16% across North Carolina. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 351 commuters (the 25% 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.
Who leaves, who stays, who comes in
On a workday 386 residents head out to work, 19 work right here, and 308 people come in from elsewhere.
About as many people by day as by night: the people who leave are replaced by the people who come in.
About as many jobs as working residents (0.81 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2024, primary jobs.
20% of working residents work in Morehead City
Where Pine Knoll Shores clocks in
20% of workers
6% of workers
5% 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.
Mostly health care, schools and offices in Pine Knoll Shores
327 jobs are based in Pine Knoll Shores.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Pine Knoll Shores, 2014 → 2024: 293 → 327. 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 2024.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Pine Knoll Shores’s own residents hold wherever they work.
In Pine Knoll Shores, the car does most of the work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Pine Knoll Shores is more walkable than 52% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 3.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 2.9% across North Carolina, on an EPA index of 6.0.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 471 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). 0.1% of Pine Knoll Shores households have no vehicle (North Carolina 5.3%, U.S. 8.4%). 4% of Pine Knoll Shores’ commuters take a bus or train.
Ranked on jobs and income, Pine Knoll Shores is 1,229th among 5,877 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% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Baxter Estates NY | 1,014 | $154K | 1.0% | 3.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 69 | Governors Club NC | 1,787 | $236K | 0.0% | 8.6% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 88 | Biltmore Forest NC | 1,469 | $169K | 2.0% | 2.5% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 267 | Northlakes NC | 1,716 | $101K | 2.0% | 1.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 1,227 | Philo IL | 1,352 | $106K | 10.3% | 0.9% | 2% | B+ |
| 1,228 | Stedman NC | 1,312 | $107K | 7.5% | 1.7% | 2% | B+ |
| 1,229 | Pine Knoll Shores NC | 1,423 | $109K | 3.5% | 3.8% | 5% | B+ |
| 1,230 | Lowell OR | 1,283 | $99K | 6.9% | 0.0% | 3% | B+ |
| 1,231 | Preble Township IN | 1,053 | $78K | 5.3% | 0.0% | 1% | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 5,877 | Oglala SD | 1,071 | $21K | 68.8% | 26.5% | 1% | 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 Pine Knoll Shores, the top three, the last and three more from North Carolina.
Next door to Pine Knoll Shores
The biggest share goes to Atlantic Beach (6%).
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Pine Knoll Shores workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pine Knoll Shores | – | B+ | B− | 26 min | $109,375 |
| Atlantic Beach | 6% | C− | B− | 21 min | $70,402 |
Same-state neighbors only. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Pine Knoll Shores’s workers. Tap a town to see its commute.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2024, 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 Pine Knoll Shores: questions
What is the median household income in Pine Knoll Shores?
$109,375 (±$13,000) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $72,388 across North Carolina and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Pine Knoll Shores?
3.5%, against 13.0% across North Carolina and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Pine Knoll Shores?
26 minutes each way on average, against 25 across North Carolina and 26 nationally. 26% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Pine Knoll Shores work?
5% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Morehead City (20%, 6 mi), Atlantic Beach (6%, 5 mi), Beaufort (5%, 10 mi) (Census LEHD 2024).
Is Pine Knoll Shores walkable?
Pine Knoll Shores is more walkable than 52% of U.S. towns (Walkability B−): an EPA walkability index of 6.0 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Pine Knoll Shores without a car?
4% of commuters take transit and <1% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Pine Knoll Shores, from the people who make the trip.
More of Pine Knoll Shores
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2024, 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.