Photo: Crimsonedge34 · CC BY-SA 3.0Most of Walters commutes out: there are 0.5 jobs for every working resident
Employers in Walters report 505 jobs; 943 of its residents have a job. For jobs and income Walters is better than 8% of U.S. towns (D); for walkability it is more walkable than 18% of U.S. towns (C−). Household incomes here are lower than in 82% of U.S. towns.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Income, poverty and work: Walters’ grade explained
Job access by car holds Walters’ grade up (ahead of 27% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down (26.8%, U.S. 12.5%).
Unemployment (3.6%) is left out: Walters’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, Walters stays D.
Who leaves Walters for work, and who comes in
On a workday 726 residents head out to work, 217 work right here, and 288 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,900 people are in Walters on a workday afternoon, 19% fewer 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.
25% of working residents work in Lawton
Where Walters clocks in
25% of workers
10% 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.
What Walters’ employers do
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Walters, 2013 → 2023: 553 → 505. 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 Walters’s own residents hold wherever they work.
A commute of about 21 minutes in Walters
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.8 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Walters workers work from home, vs 9% across Oklahoma. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 896 commuters (the 2% who work from home are left out). Across Oklahoma: 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.
Short hops and long hauls from Walters
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.
Getting around Walters: mostly by car
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 2.5% across Oklahoma.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 918 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). 11.0% of Walters households have no vehicle (Oklahoma 5.6%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Walters’ commuters take a bus or train.
Walters is 4,948th of 5,552 U.S. towns of 1,600 to 3,200 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 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,357 | Kiefer OK | 2,310 | $83K | 10.4% | 3.0% | 1% | B+ |
| 1,358 | Union City OK | 2,129 | $106K | 11.5% | 2.9% | 3% | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 2,437 | Calera OK | 3,145 | $64K | 15.7% | 1.0% | 3% | B− |
| … | |||||||
| 4,946 | Decatur MS | 1,878 | $50K | 20.7% | 6.6% | 9% | D |
| 4,947 | Unionville MO | 1,663 | $61K | 18.3% | 2.7% | 30% | D |
| 4,948 | Walters OK | 2,355 | $54K | 26.8% | 3.6% | 23% | D |
| 4,949 | St. Matthews SC | 1,827 | $51K | 31.1% | 8.1% | 6% | D |
| 4,950 | Darlington WI | 2,490 | $57K | 22.1% | 8.0% | 19% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 5,552 | Lame Deer MT | 1,872 | $24K | 55.8% | 42.2% | 60% | 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 Walters, the top three, the last and three more from Oklahoma.
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 Walters: questions
What is the median household income in Walters?
$54,425 (±$5,462) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $65,039 across Oklahoma and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Walters?
26.8%, against 15.3% across Oklahoma and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Walters?
21 minutes each way on average, against 22 across Oklahoma and 26 nationally. 2% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Walters work?
23% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Lawton (25%, 18 mi), Oklahoma City (10%, 90 mi), Duncan (5%, 24 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Walters walkable?
Walters is more walkable than 18% of U.S. towns (Walkability C−): an EPA walkability index of 6.5 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Walters without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 11% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Walters, from the people who make the trip.
More of Walters
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.