Photo: Brian Stansberry · CC BY 4.0Households in Monterey earn less than those in 92% of U.S. towns
Working from home is the commute for 3% of workers; Tennessee has 13%. Poverty touches 29.9% of residents, next to 13.8% for Tennessee as a whole. Jobs and income earn Monterey C; getting around on foot earns it D.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Monterey at work: what stands out
Monterey makes and builds things
61% of the jobs based in Monterey are in goods: factories, construction and farms. Across the jobs Monterey residents hold, wherever they work, it’s 28%. The jobs ↓
Monterey and Cookeville trade workers both ways
Cookeville is the top workplace for Monterey residents (28%) and also where the most people who work in Monterey come from (10% of its jobs). The commute map ↓
A big share show a job far from home
31% of working residents have a main job more than 50 miles away. Part of that is employers that report every worker at one head office, so not all of those trips happen daily. How far ↓
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 974 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Jobs & income in Monterey: the grade in detail
On income, poverty, unemployment and job access, Monterey is better than 27% of U.S. towns, #121 of 177 in Tennessee. Unemployment holds Monterey’s grade up (2.2%, U.S. 5.2%); the poverty rate pulls it down.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Monterey could be anywhere from C− to C+.
61% of the jobs in Monterey make or build things
1,325 jobs are based in Monterey.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Monterey, 2013 → 2023: 1,539 → 1,325. 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 Monterey’s own residents hold wherever they work.
28% of working residents work in Cookeville
Where Monterey clocks in
28% of workers
9% 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 commute from Monterey, by distance
About 31% 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.
Who works in Monterey, and who works elsewhere
On a workday 837 residents head out to work, 137 work right here, and 1,188 people come in from elsewhere.
About 3,200 people are in Monterey on a workday afternoon, 12% more than live here.
About as many jobs as working residents (1.36 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.
Commuting from Monterey: about 21 minutes a trip
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 6.6 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Monterey workers work from home, vs 13% across Tennessee. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 1,155 commuters (the 3% 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.
Getting around Monterey: mostly by car
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Monterey is more walkable than 11% of U.S. towns, #161 of 177 in Tennessee. The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any 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 1,195 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). 3.4% of Monterey households have no vehicle (Tennessee 5.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Monterey’s commuters take a bus or train.
Monterey is 3,372nd of 4,703 U.S. towns of 2,000 to 3,800 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kenilworth IL | 2,437 | $250K | 2.1% | 4.0% | 2% | A+ |
| 2 | Riverwoods IL | 3,766 | $249K | 0.7% | 0.7% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Belle Meade TN | 2,621 | $250K | 1.4% | 0.3% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 56 | Lookout Mountain TN | 2,044 | $201K | 2.3% | 0.4% | 3% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 240 | Fairmount TN | 2,110 | $137K | 3.7% | 0.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 3,370 | Dadeville AL | 2,920 | $67K | 8.4% | 8.5% | 17% | C |
| 3,371 | Mora MN | 3,763 | $53K | 16.6% | 2.6% | 34% | C |
| 3,372 | Monterey TN | 2,827 | $46K | 29.9% | 2.2% | 14% | C |
| 3,373 | Earl Township IL | 2,425 | $68K | 14.9% | 5.2% | 8% | C |
| 3,374 | Algansee Township MI | 2,047 | $78K | 26.9% | 3.6% | <1% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 4,703 | Cibecue AZ | 2,228 | $26K | 57.2% | 13.3% | 12% | 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 Monterey, 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 Monterey: questions
What is the median household income in Monterey?
$45,922 (±$5,186) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $69,595 across Tennessee and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Monterey?
29.9%, against 13.8% across Tennessee and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Monterey?
21 minutes each way on average, against 26 across Tennessee and 26 nationally. 3% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Monterey work?
14% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Cookeville (28%, 14 mi), Crossville (9%, 19 mi), Nashville (8%, 85 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Monterey walkable?
Monterey is more walkable than 11% of U.S. towns (Walkability D): an EPA walkability index of 5.6 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Monterey without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 3% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Monterey, from the people who make the trip.
More of Monterey
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.