Kirkwood is a tiny town located in the state of California. With a population of 190 people and just one neighborhood, Kirkwood is the 838th largest community in California.
Housing costs in Kirkwood are among some of the highest in the nation, although real estate prices here don't compare to real estate prices in the most expensive communities in California.
Kirkwood is a decidedly white-collar town, with fully 90.24% of the workforce employed in white-collar jobs, well above the national average. Overall, Kirkwood is a town of professionals, service providers, and managers. There are especially a lot of people living in Kirkwood who work in maintenance occupations (25.20%), teaching (20.33%), and management occupations (17.07%).
And if you like science, one thing you'll find is that Kirkwood has lots of scientists living in town - whether they be life scientists, physical scientists (like astronomers), or social scientists (like geographers!). So, if you're scientific-minded, you might like it here too.
One interesting thing about the economy is that relatively large numbers of people worked from their home: 51.22% of the workforce. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce this is high compared to the rest of the county. These workers are often telecommuters who work in knowledge-based, white-collar professions. For example, Silicon Valley has large numbers of people who telecommute. Other at-home workers may be self-employed people who operate small businesses out of their homes.
Another notable thing is that Kirkwood is a major vacation destination. Much of the town’s population is seasonal: many people own second homes and only live there part-time, during the vacation season. The effect on the local economy is that many of the businesses are dependent on tourist dollars, and may operate only during the high season. As the vacation season ends, Kirkwood’s population drops significantly, such that year-round residents will notice that the city is a much quieter place to live.
One downside of living in Kirkwood is that it can take a long time to commute to work. In Kirkwood, the average commute to work is 33.63 minutes, which is quite a bit higher than the national average.
If knowledge is power, Kirkwood is a pretty powerful place. 77.90% of the adults in Kirkwood have earned a 4-year college degree, masters degree, MD, law degree, or even PhD. Compare that to the national average of 21.84% for all cities and towns.
The per capita income in Kirkwood in 2022 was $63,863, which is upper middle income relative to California, and wealthy relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $255,452 for a family of four. However, Kirkwood contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
Kirkwood is an extremely ethnically-diverse town. The people who call Kirkwood home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Kirkwood residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Kirkwood also has a sizeable Hispanic population (people of Hispanic origin can be of any race). People of Hispanic or Latino origin account for 32.57% of the town’s residents. Important ancestries of people in Kirkwood include German, French, Russian, English, and Irish.
Foreign born people are also an important part of Kirkwood's cultural character, accounting for 27.52% of the town’s population.
The most common language spoken in Kirkwood is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and French.
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. Long commutes can be brutal. They take time, money, and energy, leaving less of you for yourself and your family. The residents of the neighborhood unfortunately have the distinction of having, on average, a longer commute than most any neighborhood in America. 15.9% of commuters here travel more than one hour just one-way to work. That is more than two hours per day. This percentage with two-hour + round-trip commutes is higher than NeighborhoodScout found in 98.9% of all neighborhoods in America.
Despite all of the residential real estate here in the neighborhood, NeighborhoodScout has discovered that much of it is vacant. In resort or second-home vacation areas, this naturally occurs because homes and apartments are seasonally occupied, and empty for a portion of the year. In non-vacation or resort areas, however, this can be an indicator of property abandonment or a weak real estate market. The vacancy rate here is 42.6%, which is higher than 98.2% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
In addition, uncrowded roads, rural America and space to be the individual you are. If you like these characteristics, this neighborhood may fit you. With just 11 residents per square mile, is less crowded than 96.9% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
The government often provides some of the more stable jobs in the economy. From local, to state, to federal government workers, the government can also be a major employer. What NeighborhoodScout's analysis revealed, is that the neighborhood in particular stands out when compared nationally for the proportion of its working residents who are employed by the government. At 13.8% of its workforce, this neighborhood has a greater concentration of government workers than 96.3% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Armenian and Portuguese ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 3.6% of this neighborhood's residents have Armenian ancestry and 3.2% have Portuguese ancestry.
is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 7.3% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Italian at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 96.2% of the neighborhoods in America.
There are two complementary measures for understanding the income of a neighborhood's residents: the average and the extremes. While a neighborhood may be relatively wealthy overall, it is equally important to understand the rate of people - particularly children - who are living at or below the federal poverty line, which is extremely low income. Some neighborhoods with a lower average income may actually have a lower childhood poverty rate than another with a higher average income, and this helps us understand the conditions and character of a neighborhood.
The neighbors in the neighborhood in Kirkwood are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 61.1% of U.S. neighborhoods. In addition, 1.6% of the children seventeen and under living in this neighborhood are living below the federal poverty line, which is a lower rate of childhood poverty than is found in 76.2% of America's neighborhoods.
The old saying "you are what you eat" is true. But it is also true that you are what you do for a living. The types of occupations your neighbors have shape their character, and together as a group, their collective occupations shape the culture of a place.
In the neighborhood, 35.7% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants, with 23.3% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations (21.0%), and 17.9% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 95.0% of households. Some people also speak Italian (7.3%).
Boston's Beacon Hill blue-blood streets, Brooklyn's Orthodox Jewish enclaves, Los Angeles' Persian neighborhoods. Each has its own culture derived primarily from the ancestries and culture of the residents who call these neighborhoods home. Likewise, each neighborhood in America has its own culture – some more unique than others – based on lifestyle, occupations, the types of households – and importantly – on the ethnicities and ancestries of the people who live in the neighborhood. Understanding where people came from, who their grandparents or great-grandparents were, can help you understand how a neighborhood is today.
In the neighborhood in Kirkwood, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (19.9%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (16.6%), and residents who report English roots (15.3%), and some of the residents are also of Mexican ancestry (12.2%), along with some Scottish ancestry residents (4.8%), 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 between 45 minutes and one hour commuting one-way to work (29.5% of working residents), longer and tougher than most commutes in America.
Here most residents (70.6%) 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 (11.7%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.