Reading, PA (College Heights South)

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 College Heights South neighborhood in Reading are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 96.7% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 29.5% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 81.7% 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 College Heights South neighborhood, 43.0% 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 20.8% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (18.7%), and 14.3% in executive, management, and professional occupations.

Languages

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 College Heights South neighborhood is Spanish, spoken by 72.9% of households. Other important languages spoken here include English and Italian.

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 College Heights South neighborhood in Reading, PA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Dominican (34.8%). There are also a number of people of Puerto Rican ancestry (21.0%), and residents who report Mexican roots (14.2%), and some of the residents are also of Italian ancestry (4.2%), along with some South American ancestry residents (4.0%), among others. In addition, 37.8% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.

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 College Heights South neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (50.3% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.

Here most residents (65.4%) 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 (25.8%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.