Photo: Dincher · CC BY-SA 3.0Fayetteville draws about two in five of Vander’s working residents
At home: 10% of workers have no commute at all (North Carolina 16%). Jobs and income earn Vander C; getting around on foot earns it D. Measured by household income, Vander is behind 63% of U.S. towns.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Vander: the figures worth knowing
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Vander
On income, poverty and job access, Vander is better than 26% of U.S. towns. Job access by car holds Vander’s grade up (ahead of 52% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down (23.4%, U.S. 12.5%).
Unemployment (4.9%) is left out: Vander’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, Vander could be anywhere from D to B+.
Where people from Vander work
Where Vander clocks in
41% 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.
How a workday changes Vander
On a workday 490 residents head out to work, 5 work right here, and 357 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.
0.73 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.
What Vander’s employers do
362 jobs are based in Vander.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Vander, 2013 → 2023: 362 → 362. 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 Vander’s own residents hold wherever they work.
About 27 minutes each way, about the NC average
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.6 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Vander workers work from home, vs 16% across North Carolina. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 541 commuters (the 10% 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.
Vander’s commute, mile by mile
About 27% 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 Vander, most people drive to work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Vander is more walkable than 7% of U.S. towns. Both inputs place Vander near the same point nationally.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 602 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). 11.6% of Vander households have no vehicle (North Carolina 5.3%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Vander’s commuters take a bus or train.
Vander is 3,886th of 5,921 U.S. towns of 1,300 to 2,600 on jobs and income
| # | 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 70 | Governors Club NC | 1,787 | $236K | 0.0% | 8.6% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 104 | Biltmore Forest NC | 1,469 | $169K | 2.0% | 2.5% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 169 | Wrightsville Beach NC | 2,397 | $152K | 4.0% | 0.4% | 7% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,884 | Platte Township NE | 2,209 | $57K | 18.0% | 2.0% | 4% | C |
| 3,885 | Lisbon NH | 1,626 | $66K | 8.6% | 1.8% | 14% | C |
| 3,886 | Vander NC | 1,922 | $67K | 23.4% | 4.9% | 1% | C |
| 3,887 | Cadott WI | 1,473 | $71K | 15.8% | 0.6% | 6% | C |
| 3,888 | Rossville Township KS | 1,893 | $63K | 14.7% | 6.5% | 1% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 5,921 | 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 Vander, the top three, the last and three more from North Carolina.
Work next door: 41% of Vander’s workers
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Vander workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vander | – | C | D | 27 min | $66,993 |
| Fayetteville | 41% | C− | A− | 19 min | $58,407 |
Same-state neighbors only. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
The biggest share goes to Fayetteville. Darker towns draw more of Vander’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 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 Vander: questions
What is the median household income in Vander?
$66,993 (±$13,417) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $72,388 across North Carolina and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Vander?
23.4%, against 13.0% across North Carolina and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Vander?
27 minutes each way on average, against 25 across North Carolina and 26 nationally. 10% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Vander work?
1% work in town.
Is Vander walkable?
Vander is more walkable than 7% of U.S. towns (Walkability D): an EPA walkability index of 5.0 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Vander without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 12% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Vander, from the people who make the trip.
More of Vander
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.