Photo: Jared Winkler · CC BY-SA 4.0Mission draws 553 commuters a day, with 2.6 jobs for every working resident
Home is the office for 0% of workers, against 10% across South Dakota. 616 jobs are based in Mission for 233 working residents. Mission grades C+ for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The commute and the jobs: Mission in brief
Mission is where the jobs are
Mission has 616 jobs, 2.6 for every working resident. Day and night ↓
Stores, warehouses and trucking
40% of the jobs in Mission are in trade, transport and utilities, against 18% of the jobs its residents hold. The jobs ↓
Few Mission workers work from home
Only 0% of workers work from home, against 10% across South Dakota. Almost everyone here travels to a job. Time on the road ↓
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; with 233 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
In and out of Mission on a workday
On a workday 170 residents head out to work and 63 work right here.
About 1,500 people are in Mission on a workday afternoon, 35% more 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.
Jobs in Mission: what the 616 are
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Mission, 2013 → 2023: 553 → 616. 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 Mission’s own residents hold wherever they work.
The trip to work from Mission: about 14 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 4.5 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Mission workers work from home, vs 10% across South Dakota. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 467 commuters (the 0% 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.
Commuting in to Mission: where workers come from
Where Mission clocks in
Lines 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.
Near or far: the trip to work from Mission
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.
Driving is how Mission gets around
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Mission is more walkable than 38% of U.S. towns. Both inputs place Mission 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 467 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). 20.5% of Mission households have no vehicle (South Dakota 5.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Mission’s commuters take a bus or train.
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 Mission: questions
What is the poverty rate in Mission?
44.0%, against 11.9% across South Dakota and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Mission?
14 minutes each way on average, against 18 across South Dakota and 26 nationally. 0% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Mission work?
27% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Two Strike (18%, 14 mi), St. Francis (11%, 17 mi), Soldier Creek (9%, 12 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Mission walkable?
Mission is more walkable than 38% of U.S. towns (Walkability C+): an EPA walkability index of 6.4 out of 20, and 2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Mission without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 20% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Mission, from the people who make the trip.
More of Mission
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.