Photo: Brian Stansberry · CC BY 4.0Household incomes put Benton near the very bottom of U.S. towns
Measured by household income, Benton is among the lowest-earning towns in the country. Below the poverty line: 22.7% of residents, against 13.8% across Tennessee. Benton grades D for jobs and income and C for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Where Benton stands out on work
30% of Benton works in Cleveland
190 working residents, 30%, have their main job in Cleveland, 12 miles away. That’s 4 times as many as work in Benton itself. The commute map ↓
Few Benton workers work from home
Only 4% of workers work from home, against 13% across Tennessee. 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 627 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
The figures behind Benton’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Benton is better than 12% of U.S. towns. Job access by car holds Benton’s grade up (ahead of 52% of U.S. towns); household income pulls it down ($29,414, U.S. $80,734).
Unemployment (10.1%) is left out: Benton’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Benton could be anywhere from D to C−.
30% of working residents work in Cleveland
Where Benton clocks in
30% of workers
14% 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.
About 26 minutes each way, about the TN average
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Benton workers work from home, vs 13% across Tennessee. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 505 commuters (the 4% who work from home are left out). Across Tennessee: 87% 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.
How many people are in Benton by day
On a workday 584 residents head out to work, 43 work right here, and 453 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 (0.79 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.
What work there is in Benton: 496 jobs
496 jobs are based in Benton.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Benton, 2013 → 2023: 379 → 496. 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 Benton’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far it is to work from Benton
About 20% 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.
In Benton, the car does most of the work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Benton is more walkable than 33% of U.S. towns. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 0.4% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 2.0% across Tennessee.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 525 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). 9.9% of Benton households have no vehicle (Tennessee 5.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Benton’s commuters take a bus or train.
For jobs and income, Benton is 5,084th of 6,308 U.S. towns of 1,000 to 2,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 3% | A+ |
| 3 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 194 | Walden TN | 1,965 | $124K | 3.1% | 4.1% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 458 | Rossville TN | 1,215 | $120K | 7.3% | 6.1% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 512 | Berry Hill TN | 1,864 | $80K | 11.2% | 3.1% | 5% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 5,082 | Colbert OK | 1,118 | $46K | 24.8% | 6.9% | 4% | D |
| 5,083 | Troy TN | 1,399 | $52K | 13.6% | 2.2% | 4% | D |
| 5,084 | Benton TN | 1,476 | $29K | 22.7% | 10.1% | 7% | D |
| 5,085 | Jefferson Township IN | 1,933 | $64K | 16.9% | 4.0% | 7% | D |
| 5,086 | Au Train Township MI | 1,007 | $64K | 14.4% | 10.3% | 8% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 6,308 | 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 Benton, the top three, the last and three more from Tennessee.
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 Benton: questions
What is the median household income in Benton?
$29,414 (±$9,393) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $69,595 across Tennessee and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Benton?
22.7%, against 13.8% across Tennessee and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Benton?
26 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Tennessee and 26 nationally. 4% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Benton work?
7% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Cleveland (30%, 12 mi), Chattanooga (14%, 35 mi), Nashville (4%, 138 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Benton walkable?
Benton is more walkable than 33% of U.S. towns (Walkability C): an EPA walkability index of 7.3 out of 20, and <1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Benton 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 Benton, from the people who make the trip.
More of Benton
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.