Photo: Billy Hathorn · CC BY-SA 3.0Wingate is a college town: 46% of residents are students
Only 3% work in Wingate; the top destination outside it is Monroe (23%, 6 miles). For jobs and income Wingate is better than 52% of U.S. towns (B−); for walkability it is more walkable than 77% of U.S. towns (A−). The average commute takes 23 minutes each way (North Carolina 25, U.S. 26).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The commute and the jobs: Wingate in brief
Many jobs in Wingate pay little
40% of the jobs based in Wingate pay $1,250 a month or less, under $15,000 a year. Young workers hold many of them: 39% of all the jobs here go to people 29 or younger. The jobs ↓
Nearly all the work in Wingate is services
94% of the jobs based here are in services, such as health care, schools and offices. Only 1% are in factories, building or farms. 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.
The four measures behind Wingate’s grade
All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Wingate’s grade.
Where students are 15% or more of the people the Census checks for poverty (17% here), the grade uses the rate without them: 10.0%, against 17.0% for all residents. Unemployment (5.7%) is left out here: students looking for part-time work count as unemployed. Income is ranked as median family income ($90,000), since student households pull the household median down ($63,068).
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for family income and poverty, Wingate could be anywhere from C− to A.
Mostly health care, schools and offices in Wingate
1,175 jobs are based in Wingate.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Wingate, 2013 → 2023: 882 → 1,175. 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 Wingate’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The daily commute in and out of Wingate
On a workday 1,503 residents head out to work, 53 work right here, and 1,122 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 (0.76 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
Where people from Wingate work
Where Wingate clocks in
23% of workers
20% 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.
Wingate’s commute takes about 23 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.5 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Wingate workers work from home, vs 16% across North Carolina. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,491 commuters (the 14% 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.
How far Wingate’s workers travel
About 23% 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.
Good to walk, short on transit: Wingate
How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 17.8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 2.9% across North Carolina, on an EPA index of 6.6.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 1,733 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 0% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about under 0.1 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 20% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 5.2% of Wingate households have no vehicle (North Carolina 5.3%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Wingate’s commuters take a bus or train.
1,991st of 3,938: where Wingate ranks among U.S. towns of 3,200 to 6,200
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Riverwoods IL | 3,766 | $249K | 0.7% | 0.7% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Mission Hills KS | 3,522 | $250K | 1.2% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Glendale MO | 6,060 | $171K | 2.0% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 86 | Jamestown NC | 3,803 | $105K | 2.5% | 0.7% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 187 | Fairview NC | 3,805 | $99K | 1.8% | 1.8% | 4% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 284 | Midland NC | 5,151 | $101K | 4.1% | 1.8% | 3% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 1,989 | Clinton Township PA | 3,608 | $74K | 16.1% | 1.7% | 11% | B− |
| 1,990 | Lawrenceburg IN | 5,243 | $51K | 13.5% | 1.6% | 21% | B− |
| 1,991 | Wingate NC | 4,628 | $63K | 17.0% | 5.7% | 3% | B− |
| 1,992 | Waldoboro ME | 5,324 | $69K | 9.6% | 0.7% | 14% | B− |
| 1,993 | Auburn IL | 4,442 | $81K | 8.1% | 5.2% | 10% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 3,938 | Lake Isabella CA | 4,059 | $27K | 40.7% | 8.6% | 18% | 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 Wingate, 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.
- Students. 46% of residents are college students; the poverty input leaves off-campus students out (above).
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Wingate: questions
What is the median household income in Wingate?
$63,068 (±$21,947) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $72,388 across North Carolina and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Wingate?
17.0% of residents live below the poverty line; leaving out college students, 10.0%. North Carolina: 13.0%.
How long is the commute from Wingate?
23 minutes each way on average, against 25 across North Carolina and 26 nationally. 14% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Wingate work?
3% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Monroe (23%, 6 mi), Charlotte (20%, 27 mi), Indian Trail (5%, 13 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Wingate walkable?
Wingate is more walkable than 77% of U.S. towns (Walkability A−): an EPA walkability index of 6.6 out of 20, and 18% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Wingate without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 5% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Wingate, from the people who make the trip.
More of Wingate
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.