Ivan Cobel House · Photo: Jatakuck · CC BY-SA 3.0College students make up 29% of Brookings’ residents
More than half work in Brookings itself; outside it, Sioux Falls draws the most (13%, 53 miles). The two grades for Brookings are B for jobs and income and A− for walkability. Working residents average 13 minutes each way; South Dakota averages 18, the U.S. 26.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Work in Brookings, in a few figures
Brookings’ biggest commute is a long one
The top workplace outside Brookings is Sioux Falls, 53 miles away as the crow flies. 13% of working residents (1,324) make that trip; no town closer to home draws more of them. How far ↓
Brookings is the work center of its corner
Every town that borders Brookings (Brookings Township, Aurora Township, Medary Township and Trenton Township) has fewer jobs than working residents, while Brookings has 1.5 per resident. Next door ↓
Commutes from Brookings are quick
The average trip to work takes 13 minutes, against 18 across South Dakota. That’s about 38 hours a year less on the road than the typical South Dakota worker. Time on the road ↓
A young workforce
30% of Brookings’ working residents are 29 or younger. The jobs ↓
Written from the Census figures on this page. Commute flows, distances and jobs are Census LEHD 2023, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey.
What drives the Jobs & income grade in Brookings
On family income, poverty and job access, Brookings is better than 57% of U.S. towns, #16 of 35 in South Dakota. Family income holds Brookings’ grade up ($105,071, U.S. $99,999); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 39% of U.S. towns). It also does well on the poverty rate.
Where students are 15% or more of the people the Census checks for poverty (20% here), the grade uses the rate without them: 8.1%, against 16.9% for all residents. Unemployment (4.5%) is left out here: students looking for part-time work count as unemployed. Income is ranked as median family income ($105,071), since student households pull the household median down ($63,493).
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for family income and poverty, Brookings could be anywhere from C+ to A−.
How many miles Brookings commutes
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.
About 13 minutes each way, quicker than most of South Dakota
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Brookings workers work from home, vs 10% across South Dakota. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 11,263 commuters (the 10% who work from home are left out). Across South Dakota: 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.
Brookings makes things: 31% of its jobs are in goods
15,183 jobs are based in Brookings.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Brookings, 2013 → 2023: 13,718 → 15,183. 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 Brookings’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Who works in Brookings, and who works elsewhere
On a workday 3,756 residents head out to work, 6,364 work right here, and 8,819 people come in from elsewhere.
About 30,000 people are in Brookings on a workday afternoon, 20% more than live here.
1.5 jobs for every working resident, so more people commute in than 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.
Where the people who work in Brookings live
Where Brookings clocks in
2% of workers
1% 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.
Brookings is easy on foot, hard by bus
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Brookings is more walkable than 80% of U.S. towns, #10 of 35 in South Dakota. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 7.1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 4.3% across South Dakota, on an EPA index of 7.7.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 12,577 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). 6.5% of Brookings households have no vehicle (South Dakota 5.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 1% of Brookings’ commuters take a bus or train.
Brookings is 915th of 1,516 U.S. towns of 18,000 to 34,000 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Springfield VA | 22,532 | $163K | 1.9% | 1.7% | 3% | A+ |
| 2 | Mountain Brook AL | 21,661 | $201K | 3.2% | 1.2% | 8% | A+ |
| 3 | Lake Forest IL | 19,731 | $235K | 3.5% | 1.8% | 12% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 912 | Watertown SD | 23,736 | $70K | 9.0% | 1.8% | 67% | B |
| 913 | Davenport FL | 18,110 | $74K | 14.0% | 2.7% | 1% | B |
| 914 | Fayetteville GA | 20,465 | $82K | 8.1% | 7.4% | 10% | B |
| 915 | Brookings SD | 25,355 | $63K | 16.9% | 4.5% | 63% | B |
| 916 | Middletown DE | 25,798 | $113K | 8.4% | 8.0% | 15% | B |
| 917 | Bellwood IL | 18,116 | $80K | 11.7% | 6.3% | 3% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 1,188 | Aberdeen SD | 27,961 | $64K | 13.8% | 3.7% | 67% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,516 | Nogales AZ | 19,495 | $43K | 28.0% | 15.7% | 37% | 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 Brookings, the top three, the last and three more from South Dakota.
How Brookings compares with the towns next door
Average commute minutes, one way
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Brookings workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brookings | – | B | A− | 13 min | $63,493 |
| Brookings Township | under 1% | — | — | 14 min | — |
| Aurora Township | under 1% | — | — | 14 min | — |
| Medary Township | under 1% | B | B+ | 17 min | $107,583 |
| Trenton Township | under 1% | — | — | 17 min | — |
Same-state neighbors only. Brookings Township, Aurora Township and Trenton Township: fewer than 1,000 residents, not graded. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Brookings’s workers. Tap a town to see its commute.
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.
- Students. 29% of residents are college students; the poverty input leaves off-campus students out (above).
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Brookings: questions
What is the median household income in Brookings?
$63,493 (±$5,892) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $75,081 across South Dakota and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Brookings?
16.9% of residents live below the poverty line; leaving out college students, 8.1%. South Dakota: 11.9%.
How long is the commute from Brookings?
13 minutes each way on average, against 18 across South Dakota and 26 nationally. 10% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Brookings work?
63% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Sioux Falls (13%, 53 mi), Watertown (2%, 46 mi), Madison (1%, 26 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Brookings walkable?
Brookings is more walkable than 80% of U.S. towns (Walkability A−): an EPA walkability index of 7.7 out of 20, and 7% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Brookings without a car?
1% of commuters take transit and 6% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Brookings, from the people who make the trip.
More of Brookings
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.