Clay Center is a very small city located in the state of Kansas. With a population of 4,094 people and just one neighborhood, Clay Center is the 82nd largest community in Kansas. Much of the housing stock in Clay Center was built prior to World War II, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Clay Center is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 37.14% of the Clay Center workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Clay Center is a city of professionals, sales and office workers, and transportation and shipping workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Clay Center who work in office and administrative support (10.54%), sales jobs (8.24%), and healthcare (6.71%).
Residents of the city have the good fortune of having one of the shortest daily commutes compared to the rest of the country. On average, they spend only 16.66 minutes getting to work every day.
Being a small city, Clay Center does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.
The citizens of Clay Center are slightly better educated than the national average of 21.84% for all cities and towns, with 24.25% of adults in Clay Center having a bachelor's degree or advanced degree.
The per capita income in Clay Center in 2022 was $28,465, which is lower middle income relative to Kansas and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $113,860 for a family of four. However, Clay Center contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
The people who call Clay Center home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Clay Center residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Important ancestries of people in Clay Center include German, English, Irish, Swedish, and French.
The most common language spoken in Clay Center is English. Other important languages spoken here include German/Yiddish and Polish.
The way a neighborhood looks and feels when you walk or drive around it, from its setting, its buildings, and its flavor, can make all the difference. This neighborhood has some really cool things about the way it looks and feels as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research. This might include anything from the housing stock to the types of households living here to how people get around.
Regardless of the means by which residents commute, this neighborhood has a length of commute that is notable. Residents of the neighborhood have the pleasure of having one of the shortest commutes to work of any neighborhood in America. 68.9% of the residents have a commute time from home to work (one way) of less than fifteen minutes. This is a higher proportion of residents enjoying a short trip to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 98.3% of U.S. neighborhoods. Less time commuting means more time for other things in life.
There is an especially high percentage of incarcerated people (1.5%) living in the neighborhood.
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Czechoslovakian and Swedish ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 0.9% of this neighborhood's residents have Czechoslovakian ancestry and 6.1% have Swedish ancestry.
How wealthy a neighborhood is, from very wealthy, to middle income, to low income is very formative with regard to the personality and character of a neighborhood. Equally important is the rate of people, particularly children, who live below the federal poverty line. In some wealthy gated communities, the areas immediately surrounding can have high rates of childhood poverty, which indicates other social issues. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals both aspects of income and poverty for this neighborhood.
The neighbors in the neighborhood in Clay Center are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 71.5% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 13.5% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 57.2% of U.S. neighborhoods.
What we choose to do for a living reflects who we are. Each neighborhood has a different mix of occupations represented, and together these tell you about the neighborhood and help you understand if this neighborhood may fit your lifestyle.
In the neighborhood, 34.9% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is executive, management, and professional occupations, with 34.6% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (18.2%), and 12.3% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 99.7% of households.
Culture is shared learned behavior. We learn it from our parents, their parents, our houses of worship, and much of our culture – our learned behavior – comes from our ancestors. That is why ancestry and ethnicity can be so interesting and important to understand: places with concentrations of people of one or more ancestries often express those shared learned behaviors and this gives each neighborhood its own culture. Even different neighborhoods in the same city can have drastically different cultures.
In the neighborhood in Clay Center, KS, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (24.3%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (16.0%), and residents who report Irish roots (10.6%), and some of the residents are also of Swedish ancestry (6.1%), along with some Mexican ancestry residents (3.2%), among others.
How you get to work – car, bus, train or other means – and how much of your day it takes to do so is a large quality of life and financial issue. Especially with gasoline prices rising and expected to continue doing so, the length and means of one's commute can be a financial burden. Some neighborhoods are physically located so that many residents have to drive in their own car, others are set up so many walk to work, or can take a train, bus, or bike. The greatest number of commuters in neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (68.9% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (84.0%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors to get to work (9.9%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.