Photo: publichall at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0Households in Sutherlin earn less than those in 86% of U.S. towns
6% of workers work from home, where Oregon as a whole has 19%. 12.6% of residents are in poverty (Oregon 11.9%). Sutherlin grades D for jobs and income and B for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Sutherlin, in a few figures
What’s behind Sutherlin’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Sutherlin is better than 11% of U.S. towns, #132 of 142 in Oregon. The poverty rate holds Sutherlin’s grade up; household income pulls it down ($51,250, U.S. $80,734).
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Sutherlin could be anywhere from D− to C+.
31% of working residents work in Roseburg
Where Sutherlin clocks in
31% of workers
5% 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.
The workday shuffle in and out of Sutherlin
On a workday 2,712 residents head out to work, 492 work right here, and 1,457 people come in from elsewhere.
About 7,400 people are in Sutherlin on a workday afternoon, 15% fewer than live here.
0.61 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.
Factories, building and farms: 31% of the jobs in Sutherlin
1,949 jobs are based in Sutherlin.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Sutherlin, 2013 → 2023: 1,566 → 1,949. 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 Sutherlin’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Sutherlin’s commute takes about 23 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.2 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Sutherlin workers work from home, vs 19% across Oregon. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 3,257 commuters (the 6% 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.
Short hops and long hauls from Sutherlin
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.
Sutherlin is a driving town
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Sutherlin is more walkable than 61% of U.S. towns, #120 of 142 in Oregon. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 0.9% 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 3,462 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 64% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 42% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 0.9 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 56% 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). 7.0% of Sutherlin households have no vehicle (Oregon 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Sutherlin’s commuters take a bus or train.
How Sutherlin compares with U.S. towns of 6,000 to 11,700
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Huntington Woods MI | 6,274 | $190K | 2.2% | 0.9% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Glendale MO | 6,060 | $171K | 2.0% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Des Peres MO | 9,102 | $224K | 2.0% | 0.5% | 5% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 181 | Bull Mountain OR | 9,865 | $165K | 4.7% | 2.3% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 216 | Oak Hills OR | 11,131 | $127K | 3.4% | 3.1% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 413 | Damascus OR | 11,437 | $123K | 3.2% | 3.6% | 4% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 2,773 | Maysville KY | 8,688 | $39K | 24.3% | 4.4% | 43% | D |
| 2,774 | Clinton NC | 8,466 | $45K | 23.6% | 4.9% | 26% | D |
| 2,775 | Sutherlin OR | 8,635 | $51K | 12.6% | 7.6% | 15% | D |
| 2,776 | Robstown TX | 10,324 | $34K | 32.2% | 8.2% | 16% | D |
| 2,777 | McComb MS | 11,697 | $41K | 27.1% | 5.6% | 35% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 2,980 | Shiprock NM | 7,610 | $36K | 34.6% | 14.9% | 14% | 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 Sutherlin, 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 Sutherlin: questions
What is the median household income in Sutherlin?
$51,250 (±$13,494) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $83,011 across Oregon and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Sutherlin?
12.6%, against 11.9% across Oregon and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Sutherlin?
23 minutes each way on average, against 23 across Oregon and 26 nationally. 6% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Sutherlin work?
15% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Roseburg (31%, 11 mi), Eugene (5%, 47 mi), Medford (4%, 76 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Sutherlin walkable?
Sutherlin is more walkable than 61% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 11.8 out of 20, and 1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Sutherlin without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 7% of households have no car. 42% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Sutherlin, from the people who make the trip.
More of Sutherlin
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.