Ohio Oil Company Building · Photo: Andrew Farkas · CC BY-SA 3.0Jobs, pay and the trip to work in Casper
The trip to work takes 17 minutes on average (Wyoming 19, U.S. 26). For jobs and income Casper is better than 45% of U.S. towns (B−); for walkability it is more walkable than 77% of U.S. towns (A−). More than half work in Casper; the top destination outside it is Mills (5%, 4 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Casper at work: what stands out
Where Casper’s Jobs & income grade comes from
All four inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Casper’s grade.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Casper could be anywhere from C+ to B.
How a workday changes Casper
On a workday 11,192 residents head out to work, 16,688 work right here, and 10,310 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 (0.97 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.
Where people from Casper work
Where Casper clocks in
Lines 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.
Inside Casper’s 26,998 jobs
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Casper, 2013 → 2023: 26,525 → 26,998. 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 Casper’s own residents hold wherever they work.
A commute of about 17 minutes in Casper
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 5.4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Casper workers work from home, vs 9% across Wyoming. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 26,228 commuters (the 11% who work from home are left out). Across Wyoming: 83% 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.
Half of Casper commutes less than 4 miles
About 16% 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.
Walkable streets, thin transit: Casper
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: 3.2% of commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 5.8% across Wyoming.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 29,320 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). 6% 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). 5.2% of Casper households have no vehicle (Wyoming 4.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 1% of Casper’s commuters take a bus or train.
Casper places 548th of 749 on jobs and income among U.S. towns of 41,000 to 79,000
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | McLean VA | 49,627 | $250K | 2.9% | 2.3% | 6% | A+ |
| 2 | Fulshear TX | 64,630 | $187K | 1.6% | 2.8% | 2% | A+ |
| 3 | Keller TX | 46,078 | $175K | 3.4% | 2.7% | 7% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 445 | Cheyenne WY | 66,507 | $79K | 8.7% | 3.7% | 70% | B |
| … | |||||||
| 546 | North Miami Beach FL | 46,236 | $63K | 14.6% | 5.5% | 6% | B− |
| 547 | Rock Hill SC | 75,911 | $69K | 12.6% | 5.8% | 29% | B− |
| 548 | Casper WY | 58,771 | $70K | 10.8% | 4.1% | 60% | B− |
| 549 | Palm Desert CA | 53,259 | $78K | 11.0% | 6.4% | 21% | B− |
| 550 | Fond du Lac WI | 44,541 | $62K | 12.4% | 4.4% | 44% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 749 | Bullhead City AZ | 43,987 | $51K | 18.7% | 11.5% | 26% | 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 Casper, the top three, the last and three more from Wyoming.
11% of Casper works in a bordering town
Average commute minutes, one way
Jobs & commute next door
| Town | Casper workers there | Jobs & income | Walkability | Commute | Household income |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Casper | – | B− | A− | 17 min | $70,218 |
| Mills | 5% | D | B− | 22 min | $50,656 |
| Red Butte | under 1% | — | — | 17 min | — |
| Evansville | 3% | B− | C+ | 15 min | $76,893 |
| Hartrandt | 3% | — | — | — | — |
Same-state neighbors only. Red Butte and Hartrandt: fewer than 1,000 residents, not graded. Commute: average minutes each way, Census ACS 2020–24.
The biggest share goes to Mills. Darker towns draw more of Casper’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 Casper: questions
What is the median household income in Casper?
$70,218 (±$2,487) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $76,176 across Wyoming and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Casper?
10.8%, against 10.5% across Wyoming and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Casper?
17 minutes each way on average, against 19 across Wyoming and 26 nationally. 10% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Casper work?
60% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Mills (5%, 4 mi), Evansville (3%, 4 mi), Hartrandt (3%, 3 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Casper walkable?
Casper is more walkable than 77% of U.S. towns (Walkability A−): an EPA walkability index of 9.2 out of 20, and 3% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Casper without a car?
1% of commuters take transit and 5% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Casper, from the people who make the trip.
More of Casper
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.