Photo: User:Magicpiano · CC BY-SA 4.0Household incomes in Barnard top those of 75% of U.S. towns
The poverty rate is 2.6% (Vermont 10.1%). Barnard grades B for jobs and income and B for walkability. Only 2% work in Barnard; the top destination outside it is Lebanon (11%, 20 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The commute and the jobs: Barnard in brief
What’s behind Barnard’s Jobs & income grade
On income, poverty and job access, Barnard is better than 63% of U.S. towns. The poverty rate holds Barnard’s grade up; job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 6% of U.S. towns). It also does well on household income.
Unemployment (4.7%) is left out: Barnard’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, Barnard could be anywhere from B− to B+.
A commute of about 29 minutes in Barnard
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 9.1 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Barnard workers work from home, vs 17% across Vermont. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 447 commuters (the 19% who work from home are left out). Across Vermont: 82% 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 a workday changes Barnard
On a workday 326 residents head out to work, 8 work right here, and 193 people come in from elsewhere.
About 870 people are in Barnard on a workday afternoon, 13% fewer than live here.
0.60 jobs for every working resident, so most people commute 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.
Commuting out of Barnard: the destinations
Where Barnard clocks in
11% of workers
11% of workers
10% 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.
Services make up most of the work in Barnard
201 jobs are based in Barnard.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Barnard, 2013 → 2023: 57 → 201. 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 Barnard’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Close to home or a long way: work trips from Barnard
About 19% 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 Barnard, the car does most of the work
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Barnard is more walkable than 57% of U.S. towns. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 4.7% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 7.2% across Vermont, on an EPA index of 6.0.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 554 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 0% of residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about under 0.1 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 20% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 0.0% of Barnard households have no vehicle (Vermont 6.2%, U.S. 8.4%). 2% of Barnard’s commuters take a bus or train.
Barnard is 653rd of 3,133 U.S. towns of 700 to 1,400 on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Baxter Estates NY | 1,014 | $154K | 1.0% | 3.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 307 | Bolton VT | 1,277 | $111K | 2.9% | 1.1% | 2% | A− |
| … | |||||||
| 405 | Cornwall VT | 1,290 | $115K | 0.8% | 7.4% | 1% | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 523 | West Windsor VT | 1,355 | $109K | 3.7% | 3.4% | 5% | B+ |
| … | |||||||
| 651 | Plymouth WI | 1,175 | $86K | 7.8% | 2.1% | <1% | B |
| 652 | Harriston VA | 1,212 | $93K | 8.3% | 0.0% | 1% | B |
| 653 | Barnard VT | 1,000 | $98K | 2.6% | 4.7% | 2% | B |
| 654 | Elkhart IA | 1,097 | $85K | 11.7% | 1.3% | 1% | B |
| 655 | Woodville WI | 1,389 | $80K | 7.4% | 1.3% | 6% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 3,133 | 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 Barnard, the top three, the last and three more from Vermont.
10% of Barnard works in a town next door
The biggest share goes to Royalton (5%).
Average commute minutes, one way
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Barnard workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barnard | – | B | B | 29 min | $97,581 |
| Royalton | 5% | B | A− | 20 min | $103,938 |
| Pomfret | 5% | — | — | 24 min | — |
| Bridgewater | under 3% | — | — | 24 min | — |
| Stockbridge | under 3% | — | — | 27 min | — |
Same-state neighbors only. Pomfret, Bridgewater and Stockbridge: fewer than 1,000 residents, not graded. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
Darker towns draw more of Barnard’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.
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Barnard: questions
What is the median household income in Barnard?
$97,581 (±$19,059) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $81,203 across Vermont and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Barnard?
2.6%, against 10.1% across Vermont and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Barnard?
29 minutes each way on average, against 24 across Vermont and 26 nationally. 19% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Barnard work?
2% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Lebanon (11%, 20 mi), Woodstock (11%, 10 mi), Hartford (10%, 13 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Barnard walkable?
Barnard is more walkable than 57% of U.S. towns (Walkability B): an EPA walkability index of 6.0 out of 20, and 5% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Barnard without a car?
2% of commuters take transit and 0% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Barnard, from the people who make the trip.
More of Barnard
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.