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Salem, IA

This is a small community in a single neighborhood. As throughout the site, some neighborhood-level data are reserved for subscribers.





Overview


Salem is a tiny city located in the state of Iowa. With a population of 380 people and just one neighborhood, Salem is the 409th largest community in Iowa. Salem has a large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.

Occupations and Workforce

When you are in Salem, you'll notice that it is more blue-collar than most other communities in America. 44.68% of Salem’s employed work in blue-collar jobs, while America averages only 27.7% that do. Overall, Salem is a city of production and manufacturing workers, sales and office workers, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in Salem who work in office and administrative support (12.06%), sales jobs (9.93%), and food service (6.38%).

Setting & Lifestyle

Salem’s overall crime rate ranks among the lowest in the nation, making it a very safe place to live.

It is a fairly quiet city because there are relatively few of those groups of people who have a tendency to be noisy. (Children, for example, often can't help themselves from being noisy, and being parents ourselves, we know!) Salem has relatively few families with children living at home, and is quieter because of it. Renters and college students, for their own reasons, can also be noisy. Salem has few renters and college students. But the biggest reason it is quieter in Salem than in most places in America, is that there are just simply fewer people living here. If you think trees make good neighbors, Salem may be for you.

One downside of living in Salem is that it can take a long time to commute to work. In Salem, the average commute to work is 30.36 minutes, which is quite a bit higher than the national average.

Salem 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.

Demographics

The citizens of Salem have a very low rate of college education: just 9.56% of people over 25 have a bachelor's degree or advanced degree, compared to a national average of 21.84% for all cities.

The per capita income in Salem in 2022 was $26,042, which is low income relative to Iowa and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $104,168 for a family of four. However, Salem contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.

Salem is a somewhat ethnically-diverse city. The people who call Salem home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Salem residents report their race to be White, followed by Asian. Important ancestries of people in Salem include German, Irish, English, European, and Scottish.

The most common language spoken in Salem is English. Other important languages spoken here include Laotian and Italian.

Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics

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.

Real Estate

Uncrowded roads, rural America and space to be the individual you are. If you like these characteristics, this neighborhood may fit you. With just 19 residents per square mile, is less crowded than 94.9% of all U.S. neighborhoods.

People

The neighborhood is a great option for families, as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's research on this neighborhood. The combination of top public schools, low crime rates, and owner-occupied single family homes, make this neighborhood among the top 8.8% of family-friendly neighborhoods in the state of Iowa. Many other families also live here, making it easy to socialize and develop a sense of community. In addition, families here highly value education, as is reflected by the strength of the local schools.

The Neighbors

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 Salem are middle-income, making it a moderate income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 53.1% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 8.8% 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 52.6% of America'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, 34.2% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer 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 27.3% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in executive, management, and professional occupations (27.0%), and 11.4% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.

Languages

The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 98.9% of households.

Ethnicity / Ancestry

Culture is the shared learned behavior of peoples. Undeniably, different ethnicities and ancestries have different cultural traditions, and as a result, neighborhoods with concentrations of residents of one or another ethnicities or ancestries will express those cultures. It is what makes the North End in Boston so fun to visit for the Italian restaurants, bakeries, culture, and charm, and similarly, why people enjoy visiting Chinatown in San Francisco.

In the neighborhood in Salem, IA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (32.2%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (10.5%), and residents who report Irish roots (6.8%), and some of the residents are also of Swedish ancestry (3.0%), along with some Italian ancestry residents (2.2%), among others.

Getting to Work

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 (41.8% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.

Here most residents (73.9%) 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 (12.2%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.


Real Estate includes:
Average Home Values
Rental Market
Housing Market Details
Neighborhood Setting
Economics & Demographics include:
Lifestyle & Special Character
Household Types
Commute To Work
Migration & Mobility
Race & Ethnic Diversity
Employment Industries & Occupations
Income & Unemployment Rate
Higher Education Attainment
Crime includes:
Neighborhood Crime Index
Crimes Per Square Mile
Property Crime Comparison
Violent Crime Comparison
Schools include:
School Ratings
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Public School Test Scores
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Educational Expenditures

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