Universal is a tiny town located in the state of Indiana. With a population of 284 people and just one neighborhood, Universal is the 444th largest community in Indiana. Universal has a large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic towns in the country.
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Universal is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 39.06% of the Universal workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Universal is a town of production and manufacturing workers, managers, and sales and office workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Universal who work in management occupations (21.88%), sales jobs (18.75%), and healthcare (12.50%).
Telecommuters are a relatively large percentage of the workforce: 9.68% 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.
It is a fairly quiet town 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!) Universal 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. Universal has few renters and college students. But the biggest reason it is quieter in Universal than in most places in America, is that there are just simply fewer people living here. If you think trees make good neighbors, Universal may be for you.
Residents of the town have the good fortune of having one of the shortest daily commutes compared to the rest of the country. On average, they spend only 16.34 minutes getting to work every day.
Being a small town, Universal does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.
The rate of college-level education in Universal is quite a bit lower than the national average among all cities of 21.84%: just 10.32% of people here over 25 have a bachelor's degree or an advanced degree.
The per capita income in Universal in 2022 was $24,578, which is low income relative to Indiana and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $98,312 for a family of four.
The people who call Universal home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Universal residents report their race to be White. Important ancestries of people in Universal include German, Irish, English, Slavic, and Italian.
The most common language spoken in Universal is English. Other important languages spoken here include Italian and Polish.
Many things matter about a neighborhood, but the first thing most people notice is the way a neighborhood looks and its particular character. For example, one might notice whether the buildings all date from a certain time period or whether shop signs are in multiple languages. This particular neighborhood in Universal, the neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
While most Americans do drive to work alone each day, the neighborhood stands out by having 88.6% of commuters doing so, which is a higher proportion of people driving alone to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 96.5% of all American neighborhoods.
Whether walking, biking, riding, or driving, the length of one's commute is an important factor for one's quality of life. The neighborhood stands out for its commute length, according to NeighborhoodScout's analysis. 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. 10.0% 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 95.6% of all neighborhoods in America.
Significantly, 14.6% 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 99.1% 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 Universal are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 69.2% of the neighborhoods in America. With 20.2% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 70.3% 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, 33.8% 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 29.2% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (26.3%), and 10.8% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 99.7% of households. Some people also speak Italian (14.6%).
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 Universal, IN, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as English (16.6%). There are also a number of people of German ancestry (11.7%), and residents who report Italian roots (5.3%), and some of the residents are also of Irish ancestry (4.7%), along with some Mexican ancestry residents (2.3%), 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 (31.7% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America. However, there is also a significant group of residents (10.0%) who commute over an hour in each direction.
Here most residents (88.6%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.