Photo: Nigel Thompson · CC BY-SA 2.0Jobless benefit claims are lower in Bearsted than in 92% of UK towns
Set against UK towns, the Jobs & income grade of Bearsted is A+, #3 of 87 in Kent. Jobless benefit claims cover 1.3% of working-age residents, where the typical UK town’s rate is 2.7%. Every working day, 1,517 residents go out to work, and 750 people come the other way.
Work in Bearsted, in a few figures
Fewer jobs than working residents
1,400 jobs are based in Bearsted for 3,770 working residents; the typical UK town has 0.7 jobs per resident in work. Restaurants, cafés and pubs, shops and hospitals and health care make up 39% of them. Jobs based here ↓
Fewer benefit claims than most towns
The typical UK town: 2.7%; England and Wales: 4% so far in 2026. Claims across the Maidstone council area have run below the national rate every month since 2015. Benefits over time ↓
Written from the data on this page: ONS Census 2021 and BRES, DWP claimant counts via Nomis, and ONS household income.
On jobs and income, Bearsted grades A+
Better than 98% of UK towns on four measures taken together: #3 of 87 in Kent.
Its strongest measure is the claimant rate; its weakest, getting to jobs without a car.
How the grade works
Each input is ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more (higher income and job access are better; fewer claimants and less employment deprivation are better), the four ranks are averaged, and the average is ranked again. A town needs three of the four.
Jobless claims in the Maidstone council area have run below England and Wales every month since 2015
Maidstone’s rate was about 1.7% in 2019, peaked at 5.4% in May 2020 and has averaged 3.4% in 2026, against 4% across England and Wales. Claims everywhere stay higher than before the pandemic, partly because Universal Credit counts more people on low pay as looking for work.
The chart is the whole council area of Maidstone, which Nomis publishes monthly; the figures above the line are for Bearsted’s built-up area. Claimant count: people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance, or Universal Credit while required to look for work. Employment deprivation counts people out of work on Jobseeker’s Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefit, Severe Disablement Allowance, Carer’s Allowance or the Universal Credit equivalents (English Indices of Deprivation 2025). The “most deprived tenth” compares areas within England only.
Claimant rate since 2015: people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance or Universal Credit while looking for work, as a share of residents aged 16 to 64 (DWP, via Nomis).
Bearsted is quieter on a working day than at night
3,770 residents were in work at the 2021 Census; 2,992 people worked in Bearsted.
For every person who comes in to work, about 2 residents travel out. 8% of residents who travel to a workplace stay in the town; in the typical UK town of 2,500+ it’s 14%.
The middle of each bar is the same people: residents who work in the town or from home.
Most of Bearsted’s commuters who leave work in Maidstone and the places around
- Maidstone346
- Countryside68
- Gillingham37
- Chatham33
- Ashford29
- Coxheath25
- Sittingbourne19
- Larkfield17
- Rochester14
- Lenham and Harrietsham12
- Maidstone560
- Countryside167
- Larkfield67
- Rochester45
- Ashford44
- Chatham36
- Gillingham36
- Sittingbourne28
- Lenham and Harrietsham27
- Coxheath21
Coming the other way, Maidstone sends the most (346).
The ten places that send the most workers into Bearsted, and the ten where its residents most often work (Census 2021, by home and workplace). Line width is the number of people.
1,400 jobs, one in five in health and social care
0.4 for every working resident; the typical UK town has 0.7.
BRES counts jobs, not people (a part-time job and a second job count once each), so it runs above the Census count of people working here (2,992). Small areas are shared out to the town by where their Census 2021 workers were based; kinds of work are BRES industry divisions (SIC 2007), rounded. England’s towns: all jobs in its built-up areas.
Jobs at workplaces in Bearsted (employees and working owners, ONS Business Register and Employment Survey 2024).
Bearsted households bring in £68,801 a year on average
Higher than 87% of UK towns of 2,500+; the typical town is £52,385. The whole council area of Maidstone averages £60,779.
The town figure is ONS’s neighbourhood (MSOA) estimates shared out by where the town’s residents live.
Total household income before tax, mean, year to March 2023 (ONS small-area estimates).
Bearsted commutes on foot, by bike or bus for 12% of trips
Median journey 8.2 km; typical UK town 8.4 km.
39% of journeys to work are under 5 km (3 miles), against 45% across England’s towns, and 14% are 30 km or more. Bearsted grades C+ for walkability: the share of commuters who walk, cycle or take public transport, against UK towns.
ONS Census 2021, TS061 (method of travel) and TS058 (distance, straight line from home to workplace), output areas summed. Census day fell in the third lockdown, so fewer people travelled than usual.
How residents who travel to work get there, and how far they go (Census 2021, not counting those working mainly at home).
A retired town: 33% of adults in Bearsted
ONS Census 2021, tables TS066 (economic activity) and TS063 (occupation), output areas summed to the built-up area. England’s towns: everyone living in its built-up areas.
Everyone 16 and over, by what they were doing the week before the 2021 Census, and the jobs of those in work.
Out of 421 UK towns of 6,000 to 11,000, Bearsted comes 13th on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Jobs per worker | Work in own town | Claimants | Income | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Twyford Berkshire | 8,072 | 0.9 | 11% | 1.5% | £82K | A+ |
| 2 | Esher Surrey | 9,484 | 1.6 | 12% | 1.6% | £91K | A+ |
| 3 | Whiteley Hampshire | 9,350 | 6.4 | 16% | 1.3% | £78K | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 11 | Lightwater Surrey | 6,539 | 0.4 | 7% | 1.4% | £76K | A+ |
| 12 | Bourne End Buckinghamshire | 7,166 | 1.3 | 10% | 1.8% | £72K | A+ |
| 13 | Bearsted Kent | 8,349 | 0.4 | 8% | 1.3% | £69K | A+ |
| 14 | Otford and Kemsing Kent | 7,332 | 0.8 | 9% | 1.4% | £74K | A+ |
| 15 | Hook Hampshire | 9,062 | 1.4 | 12% | 1.9% | £85K | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 24 | Kings Hill Kent | 9,963 | 2.1 | 13% | 1.9% | £90K | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 102 | Rusthall and Langton Green Kent | 7,783 | 0.4 | 10% | 2.5% | £72K | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 110 | Stone Kent | 6,438 | 4.1 | 7% | 3% | £66K | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 421 | Mablethorpe Lincolnshire | 7,633 | 1.1 | 39% | 5.2% | £30K | D− |
Jobs & income letters rank against every UK town of 1,000 or more; the order here is context only.
Ordered by Jobs & income Grade: the top three, the towns either side of Bearsted, and others in Kent.
Bearsted and its neighbours: work and income
| Town | People | Jobs | Work in own town | Claimants | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bearsted | 8,349 | 1,400 | 8% | 1.3% | A+ |
| Maidstone | 109,503 | 57,768 | 42% | 4.1% | B− |
| Kingswood | 1,371 | 499 | 3% | 2.5% | C+ |
| Sutton Valence | 1,457 | 774 | 16% | 2.4% | B |
| Coxheath | 8,453 | 2,059 | 7% | 3% | B |
| Lenham and Harrietsham | 4,763 | 2,129 | 16% | 3.8% | C |
| Eccles | 1,706 | 179 | 2% | 2.4% | B |
| Burham | 1,293 | 171 | 5% | 2.4% | B− |
Jobs based in each place, commuters who stay in their own town, and the claimant rate.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- The Census was taken in lockdown. Census day was 21 March 2021, during the third national lockdown: many people were furloughed or working from home, so fewer travelled to work, and journeys were shorter, than before the pandemic or since. The flows on this page show where people worked that spring.
- At home and no fixed place are one figure. In the workplace flows, ONS puts people who mainly worked at home and people with no fixed workplace (drivers, builders, care workers on rounds) at their home address, so the two can’t be told apart there.
- Towns are built-up areas. Bearsted here is ONS’s built-up area: the town as built, not its council district. A workplace on an estate or farm outside every built-up area counts as “outside any built-up area”.
- Jobs are counted where they are. BRES counts jobs at each workplace (employees and working owners, rounded by ONS), so a town with a hospital, university or big employer can have more jobs than working residents. Small areas are shared out to towns by where their Census workers were based.
- The benefits chart is the council area. Nomis publishes the claimant count monthly for councils back to 2013, so the line is Maidstone as a whole; the claimant rate elsewhere on this page is Bearsted’s built-up area, from small areas.
Questions about work in Bearsted
Where do people in Bearsted work?
At the 2021 Census, 8% of Bearsted’s residents who travelled to work worked in the town itself; the most common other places were Maidstone (560), Larkfield (67) and Rochester (45). 56% of working residents worked mainly at home or had no fixed workplace; the Census was taken in lockdown, so home working was unusually high.
How many people commute into Bearsted?
750 people who lived elsewhere worked in Bearsted at the 2021 Census, 25% of its 2,992 workers. The most came from Maidstone (346), Gillingham (37) and Chatham (33). 1,517 residents travelled out the other way.
How many jobs are there in Bearsted?
About 1,400 jobs (employees and working owners) were based in Bearsted in 2024, on ONS’s Business Register and Employment Survey: 0.4 for every resident in work, against 0.7 in the typical UK town. The biggest kinds of work are restaurants, cafés and pubs (about 240), shops (about 220) and hospitals and health care (about 220).
Is Bearsted a good place to find work?
Bearsted earns an A+ for jobs and income, better than 98% of UK towns on household income, the claimant rate, employment deprivation and access to jobs together. Mean household income £68,801; 1.3% of 16 to 64s claim unemployment benefits.
How do people in Bearsted get to work?
86% of commuters go by car or van, 6% walk, 1% cycle and 5% take the bus or train; 39% travel under 5 km. Census 2021, taken during lockdown.
What is the average household income in Bearsted?
Mean household income before tax was £68,801 in the year to March 2023 (ONS), against £52,385 in the typical UK town.
How does Bearsted compare with Maidstone for jobs?
Bearsted has 0.4 jobs per working resident against Maidstone’s 1.1, a 1.3% claimant rate against 4.1%, and mean household income of £68,801 against £58,325.
Sources: ONS Census 2021 origin-destination data, place of work (ODWP01EW), output areas summed to the ONS 2022 built-up area · ONS Census 2021 tables TS058 (distance), TS061 (method of travel), TS063 (occupation) and TS066 (economic activity) · ONS Business Register and Employment Survey via Nomis (open access), by industry division · ONS small-area income estimates (financial year ending 2023); House of Commons Library MSOA names · DWP claimant count via Nomis (towns January to August 2026; councils, regions and England and Wales monthly since January 2015) · MHCLG English Indices of Deprivation 2025 · DfT Transport Connectivity Metric (employment) · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranked against UK towns only. All under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.