Cresco is a very small city located in the state of Iowa. With a population of 3,890 people and just one neighborhood, Cresco is the 121st largest community in Iowa. Cresco has a large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Cresco is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 37.04% of the Cresco workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Cresco is a city of sales and office workers, professionals, and production and manufacturing workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Cresco who work in office and administrative support (10.93%), sales jobs (9.31%), and healthcare (9.11%).
Telecommuters are a relatively large percentage of the workforce: 8.53% of people work from home. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce it is high relative to the nation. 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.
Overall, Cresco’s crime rate is one of the lowest in the nation, which makes a great place to live if safety is an important concern.
One of the benefits of Cresco is that there is very little traffic. The average commute to work is 17.79 minutes, which is substantially less than the national average. Not only does this mean that the drive to work is less aggravating, but noise and pollution levels are lower as a result.
Cresco is a small city, and as such doesn't have a public transit system that people use to get to and from their jobs every day.
The percentage of adults in Cresco who are college-educated is close to the national average for all communities of 21.84%: 20.70% of the adults in Cresco have a bachelor's degree or advanced degree.
The per capita income in Cresco in 2022 was $29,235, which is low income relative to Iowa, and lower middle income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $116,940 for a family of four. However, Cresco contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
The people who call Cresco home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Cresco residents report their race to be White, followed by Native American. Important ancestries of people in Cresco include German, Norwegian, Czech, Irish, and Polish.
The most common language spoken in Cresco is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish 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. 65.6% 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 97.6% of U.S. neighborhoods. Less time commuting means more time for other things in life.
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Norwegian and German ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 19.2% of this neighborhood's residents have Norwegian ancestry and 39.1% have German 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 Cresco are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 71.7% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 16.1% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 63.6% of U.S. neighborhoods.
A neighborhood is far different if it is dominated by enlisted military personnel rather than people who earn their living by farming. It is also different if most of the neighbors are clerical support or managers. What is wonderful is the sheer diversity of neighborhoods, allowing you to find the type that fits your lifestyle and aspirations.
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 31.0% 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 14.1% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
The languages spoken by people in this neighborhood are diverse. These are tabulated as the languages people preferentially speak when they are at home with their families. The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 96.8% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Polish.
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 Cresco, IA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (39.1%). There are also a number of people of Norwegian ancestry (19.2%), and residents who report Irish roots (8.6%), and some of the residents are also of Polish ancestry (4.8%), along with some English ancestry residents (2.9%), among others.
Even if your neighborhood is walkable, you may still have to drive to your place of work. Some neighborhoods are located where many can get to work in just a few minutes, while others are located such that most residents have a long and arduous commute. The greatest number of commuters in neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (65.6% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (80.7%) 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 (5.9%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.