Chicago, IL (E 61st St / S Michigan Ave)

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 E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood in Chicago are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 99.1% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 78.4% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 99.3% of U.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 E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood, 38.0% of the working population is employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations, with 30.2% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in executive, management, and professional occupations (22.2%), and 9.5% in manufacturing and laborer occupations.

Languages

The most common language spoken in the E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood is English, spoken by 94.5% of households. Some people also speak Spanish (3.3%).

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 E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood in Chicago, IL, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Sub-Saharan African (24.1%). There are also a number of people of African ancestry (20.2%), and residents who report Puerto Rican roots (2.9%), and some of the residents are also of German ancestry (1.5%), along with some Irish ancestry residents (1.5%), 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 E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood spend between 45 minutes and one hour commuting one-way to work (50.2% of working residents), longer and tougher than most commutes in America.

Here most residents (45.4%) ride the bus to get to work. In addition, quite a number also drive alone in a private automobile to get to work (19.4%) and 15.4% of residents also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors for their daily commute. The bus provides a valuable service in the E 61st St / S Michigan Ave neighborhood of Chicago by getting a lot of residents to and from work daily, reducing the costs of commuting and reducing some congestion on the roads as well.