Photo: Cobrakeeper · CC BY-SA 4.0Riddle has lower household incomes than 63% of U.S. towns
19.0% of residents are in poverty (Oregon 11.9%). The two grades for Riddle are D for jobs and income and B+ for walkability. Working from home is the commute for 8% of workers, against 19% across Oregon.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Riddle’s Jobs & income grade, measure by measure
On income, poverty and job access, Riddle is better than 13% of U.S. towns. Household income holds Riddle’s grade up ($66,761, U.S. $80,734); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 15% of U.S. towns).
Unemployment (6.1%) is left out: Riddle’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, Riddle could be anywhere from D− to C.
Riddle by day and by night
On a workday 314 residents head out to work, 19 work right here, and 255 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 (0.82 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.
14% of working residents work in Roseburg
Where Riddle clocks in
14% of workers
8% 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.
Factories, building and farms: 28% of the jobs in Riddle
274 jobs are based in Riddle.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Riddle, 2013 → 2023: 254 → 274. 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 Riddle’s own residents hold wherever they work.
About 21 minutes each way for Riddle’s commuters
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.6 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Riddle workers work from home, vs 19% across Oregon. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 353 commuters (the 8% who work from home are left out). Across Oregon: 80% drive alone, 3% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Half of Riddle commutes less than 18 miles
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.
For most of Riddle, work means a drive
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Riddle is more walkable than 70% of U.S. towns. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 1.4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 8.4% across Oregon.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 385 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 81% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 81% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 0.3 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 47% 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). 1.5% of Riddle households have no vehicle (Oregon 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 1% of Riddle’s commuters take a bus or train.
How Riddle ranks: 3,357th of 4,312 U.S. towns of 900 to 1,600
| # | 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 138 | Stafford OR | 1,600 | $163K | 6.9% | 5.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 143 | Coburg OR | 1,373 | $98K | 1.5% | 8.9% | 5% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 230 | Aurora OR | 1,113 | $108K | 6.1% | 2.1% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 3,355 | Cave Spring GA | 1,228 | $51K | 12.6% | 1.3% | 3% | D |
| 3,356 | Oxford NY | 1,322 | $56K | 14.6% | 5.1% | 5% | D |
| 3,357 | Riddle OR | 1,218 | $67K | 19.0% | 6.1% | 6% | D |
| 3,358 | Iola WI | 1,210 | $45K | 13.7% | 4.2% | 12% | D |
| 3,359 | Martinsville Township IL | 1,486 | $67K | 19.3% | 3.6% | 7% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 4,312 | 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 Riddle, the top three, the last and three more from Oregon.
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 Riddle: questions
What is the median household income in Riddle?
$66,761 (±$12,954) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $83,011 across Oregon and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Riddle?
19.0%, against 11.9% across Oregon and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Riddle?
21 minutes each way on average, against 23 across Oregon and 26 nationally. 8% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Riddle work?
6% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Roseburg (14%, 19 mi), Canyonville (8%, 5 mi), Grants Pass (4%, 36 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Riddle walkable?
Riddle is more walkable than 70% of U.S. towns (Walkability B+): an EPA walkability index of 12.9 out of 20, and 1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Riddle without a car?
1% of commuters take transit and 2% of households have no car. 81% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Riddle, from the people who make the trip.
More of Riddle
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.