Photo: Bill Fitzpatrick · CC BY-SA 3.0Woodruff has 0.5 jobs for every working resident, so most commute out
1,114 jobs are based in Woodruff, and 2,026 of its residents work somewhere. Jobs and income earn Woodruff C+; getting around on foot earns it B. Only 5% work in Woodruff itself; outside it, Greenville draws the most (10%, 20 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Woodruff: the figures worth knowing
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Woodruff
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Woodruff is better than 39% of U.S. towns, #77 of 168 in South Carolina. Job access by car holds Woodruff’s grade up (ahead of 55% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down (14.2%, U.S. 12.5%).
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Woodruff could be anywhere from C− to A−.
What Woodruff’s employers do
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Woodruff, 2013 → 2023: 1,066 → 1,114. 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 Woodruff’s own residents hold wherever they work.
In and out of Woodruff on a workday
On a workday 1,916 residents head out to work, 110 work right here, and 1,004 people come in from elsewhere.
About 5,100 people are in Woodruff on a workday afternoon, 15% 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.
Out of Woodruff to work: where people go
Where Woodruff clocks in
10% of workers
8% of workers
3% 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 trip to work from Woodruff: about 28 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.9 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Woodruff workers work from home, vs 12% across South Carolina. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 2,177 commuters (the 5% who work from home are left out). Across South Carolina: 86% 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.
Woodruff’s commute, mile by mile
About 16% 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.
The commute in Woodruff is mostly behind the wheel
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Woodruff is more walkable than 65% of U.S. towns, #50 of 169 in South Carolina. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 4.4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 2.4% across South Carolina, on an EPA index of 6.9.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 2,281 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). 9.8% of Woodruff households have no vehicle (South Carolina 5.7%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Woodruff’s commuters take a bus or train.
Woodruff is 2,219th of 3,394 U.S. towns of 4,200 to 8,100 on jobs and income
| # | 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 | Ho-Ho-Kus NJ | 4,313 | $250K | 0.0% | 1.7% | 6% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 79 | Isle of Palms SC | 4,377 | $157K | 2.5% | 1.3% | 13% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 215 | Lake Murray of Richland SC | 7,023 | $119K | 2.0% | 2.3% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 698 | Baxter Village SC | 4,542 | $152K | 9.2% | 4.1% | 3% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 2,217 | Dillon MT | 4,271 | $61K | 11.5% | 1.2% | 45% | C+ |
| 2,218 | Dalton MA | 6,157 | $79K | 7.4% | 7.2% | 14% | C+ |
| 2,219 | Woodruff SC | 6,026 | $71K | 14.2% | 4.8% | 5% | C+ |
| 2,220 | New Burlington OH | 5,426 | $73K | 12.6% | 12.6% | 2% | C+ |
| 2,221 | Manitou Springs CO | 4,577 | $85K | 11.2% | 11.8% | 14% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 3,394 | Medina TX | 4,226 | $22K | 53.8% | 10.1% | 4% | 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 Woodruff, the top three, the last and three more from South 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.
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Woodruff: questions
What is the median household income in Woodruff?
$70,959 (±$12,924) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $69,324 across South Carolina and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Woodruff?
14.2%, against 14.1% across South Carolina and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Woodruff?
28 minutes each way on average, against 26 across South Carolina and 26 nationally. 5% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Woodruff work?
5% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Greenville (10%, 20 mi), Spartanburg (8%, 15 mi), Mauldin (3%, 15 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Woodruff walkable?
Woodruff is more walkable than 65% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 6.9 out of 20, and 4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Woodruff without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 10% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Woodruff, from the people who make the trip.
More of Woodruff
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.