Louis Smith Tainter House · Photo: Bobak Ha'Eri · CC BY 3.0College students make up 29% of Menomonie’s residents
Jobs and income earn Menomonie C+; getting around on foot earns it A. About two in five work in Menomonie itself; outside it, Eau Claire draws the most (10%, 21 miles). Working residents average 17 minutes each way; Wisconsin averages 22, the U.S. 26.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Where Menomonie stands out on work
Menomonie is where the jobs are
Menomonie has 14,438 jobs, 2.1 for every working resident. On a workday afternoon about 24,000 people are in town, 46% more than the 17,000 who live here. Day and night ↓
A young workforce
32% of Menomonie’s working residents are 29 or younger. The jobs ↓
The biggest group of Menomonie’s workers comes from Eau Claire
1,128 of the people who work in Menomonie live in Eau Claire, 21 miles away, more than from any other town. The commute map ↓
Menomonie draws workers from far and wide
The 14,438 jobs in Menomonie are filled from a wide area. Menomonie’s own residents hold 19% and the ten next-biggest home towns 23%; the other 58% come from many towns beyond those. The commute map ↓
Commutes from Menomonie are quick
The average trip to work takes 17 minutes, against 22 across Wisconsin. That’s about 38 hours a year less on the road than the typical Wisconsin worker. Time on the road ↓
Written from the Census figures on this page. Commute flows, distances and jobs are Census LEHD 2024, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey.
Jobs & income in Menomonie: the grade in detail
On family income, poverty and job access, Menomonie is better than 43% of U.S. towns, #310 of 362 in Wisconsin. All three inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Menomonie’s grade.
Where students are 15% or more of the people the Census checks for poverty (16% here), the grade uses the rate without them: 11.6%, against 17.7% for all residents. Unemployment (5.8%) is left out here: students looking for part-time work count as unemployed. Income is ranked as median family income ($91,530), since student households pull the household median down ($56,889).
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for family income and poverty, Menomonie could be anywhere from C to B.
How a workday changes Menomonie
On a workday 4,073 residents head out to work, 2,747 work right here, and 11,691 people come in from elsewhere.
About 24,000 people are in Menomonie on a workday afternoon, 46% more than live here.
2.1 jobs for every working resident, so more people commute in than out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2024, primary jobs.
What Menomonie’s employers do
14,438 jobs are based in Menomonie.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Menomonie, 2014 → 2024: 12,102 → 14,438. 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 2024.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Menomonie’s own residents hold wherever they work.
Where Menomonie’s workers come from
Where Menomonie clocks in
2% 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.
Time on the road from Menomonie: about 17 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 5.5 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Menomonie workers work from home, vs 13% across Wisconsin. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 7,954 commuters (the 8% who work from home are left out). Across Wisconsin: 86% 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.
Near or far: the trip to work from Menomonie
About 27% 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 2024.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
Menomonie is more walkable than most U.S. towns, with limited transit
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Menomonie is more walkable than 90% of U.S. towns, #17 of 362 in Wisconsin. How people get to work scores higher than the street layout: 14.1% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, against 4.8% across Wisconsin, on an EPA index of 8.5.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 8,655 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). 5.5% of Menomonie households have no vehicle (Wisconsin 6.4%, U.S. 8.4%). <1% of Menomonie’s commuters take a bus or train.
Out of 1,888 U.S. towns of 12,000 to 22,000, Menomonie comes 1,317th on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Plain Township OH | 13,257 | $219K | 2.1% | 0.8% | 10% | A+ |
| 2 | Rogers MN | 15,606 | $159K | 1.9% | 1.2% | 10% | A+ |
| 3 | Trophy Club TX | 13,695 | $201K | 2.1% | 2.0% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 35 | Greenville WI | 13,388 | $118K | 1.7% | 0.8% | 9% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 48 | Whitefish Bay WI | 14,489 | $157K | 3.7% | 2.6% | 7% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 52 | Verona WI | 16,821 | $120K | 1.4% | 1.6% | 22% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,315 | Vero Beach FL | 17,603 | $70K | 16.1% | 3.4% | 25% | C+ |
| 1,316 | Noble Township IN | 13,633 | $65K | 12.6% | 3.1% | 43% | C+ |
| 1,317 | Menomonie WI | 16,664 | $57K | 17.7% | 5.8% | 40% | C+ |
| 1,318 | Hickory Point Township IL | 17,474 | $59K | 10.4% | 4.6% | 11% | C+ |
| 1,319 | Kailua HI | 21,818 | $88K | 14.3% | 4.0% | 29% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,888 | Douglas AZ | 16,038 | $42K | 27.8% | 12.3% | 28% | 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 Menomonie, the top three, the last and three more from Wisconsin.
Work in the towns next to Menomonie
Jobs & commute next door
Darker towns draw more of Menomonie’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 2024, primary jobs, where the employer reports them. Income, poverty, unemployment, commute time and how people travel: Census ACS 2020–24 averages.
- Students. 29% of residents are college students; the poverty input leaves off-campus students out (above).
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Menomonie: questions
What is the median household income in Menomonie?
$56,889 (±$5,439) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $77,485 across Wisconsin and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Menomonie?
17.7% of residents live below the poverty line; leaving out college students, 11.6%. Wisconsin: 10.6%.
How long is the commute from Menomonie?
17 minutes each way on average, against 22 across Wisconsin and 26 nationally. 8% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Menomonie work?
40% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Eau Claire (10%, 21 mi), Hudson (2%, 40 mi), Union (2%, 16 mi) (Census LEHD 2024).
Is Menomonie walkable?
Menomonie is more walkable than 90% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 8.5 out of 20, and 14% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Menomonie without a car?
<1% of commuters take transit and 6% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Menomonie, from the people who make the trip.
More of Menomonie
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2024, 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.