Photo: Nyttend · Public domainKnox at work: jobs, income and the commute
Only 6% work in Knox itself; outside it, Paint Township draws the most (9%, 7 miles). The two grades for Knox are C for jobs and income and A for walkability. Working from home is the commute for 9% of workers, next to 16% for Pennsylvania as a whole.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The four measures behind Knox’s grade
On income, poverty and job access, Knox is better than 26% of U.S. towns. All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Knox’s grade.
Unemployment (7.5%) is left out: Knox’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, Knox could be anywhere from D to B−.
Who leaves Knox for work, and who comes in
On a workday 390 residents head out to work, 27 work right here, and 381 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 (0.98 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 Knox’s working residents head each day
Where Knox clocks in
9% of workers
8% of workers
6% 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.
Inside Knox’s 408 jobs
408 jobs are based in Knox.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Knox, 2013 → 2023: 342 → 408. 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 Knox’s own residents hold wherever they work.
About 22 minutes each way for Knox’s commuters
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.9 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Knox workers work from home, vs 16% across Pennsylvania. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 513 commuters (the 9% who work from home are left out). Across Pennsylvania: 81% drive alone, 4% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
How many miles Knox commutes
About 25% 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.
Knox is easy on foot, hard by bus
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Knox is more walkable than 94% of U.S. towns. Both inputs place Knox 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 564 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). 8.6% of Knox households have no vehicle (Pennsylvania 10.4%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Knox’s commuters take a bus or train.
Knox is 1,872nd of 3,133 U.S. towns of 700 to 1,400 on jobs and income
| # | 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+ |
| … | |||||||
| 7 | Bryn Athyn PA | 1,304 | $143K | 0.3% | 2.6% | 16% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 11 | Rose Valley PA | 1,017 | $247K | 2.9% | 1.5% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 22 | Bradford Woods PA | 1,126 | $153K | 1.9% | 1.4% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,870 | Tuolumne City CA | 1,148 | $57K | 7.5% | 0.0% | 8% | C |
| 1,871 | De Soto IL | 1,388 | $63K | 16.3% | 8.0% | 3% | C |
| 1,872 | Knox PA | 1,068 | $69K | 12.9% | 7.5% | 6% | C |
| 1,873 | Fifth Ward LA | 1,277 | $51K | 5.7% | 5.0% | 1% | C |
| 1,874 | Craig AK | 1,062 | $68K | 7.9% | 4.6% | — | C |
| … | |||||||
| 3,133 | 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 Knox, the top three, the last and three more from Pennsylvania.
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 Knox: questions
What is the median household income in Knox?
$69,000 (±$28,072) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $77,971 across Pennsylvania and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Knox?
12.9%, against 11.7% across Pennsylvania and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Knox?
22 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Pennsylvania and 26 nationally. 9% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Knox work?
6% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Paint Township (9%, 7 mi), Beaver Township (8%, 2 mi), Clarion (6%, 8 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Knox walkable?
Knox is more walkable than 94% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 12.2 out of 20, and 8% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Knox without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 9% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Knox, from the people who make the trip.
More of Knox
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.