This is a small community in a single neighborhood.
As throughout the site, some neighborhood-level data are reserved for subscribers.
What do we mean by a neighborhood?
NeighborhoodScout® uses the official government designation for neighborhoods - the census tract.
Census tracts are small, relatively permanent subdivisions of a county that are defined by the U.S. Census Bureau in conjunction with local authorities all across the country to define real neighborhoods that are bounded to contain areas with homogeneous population characteristics (including economic status, lifestyle, and living conditions). Census tracts usually have 4,000 persons, but can range between 1,500 and 8,000 persons. This is the most fine-grained area for which detailed information is made available from the government, to protect the individual privacy of each of us. Because census tracts are based on population, they vary in size depending on the density of settlement. In urban areas, they are small, and in rural areas they can cover an entire small town or even a few small towns in very rural areas.
Since census tracts are subdivisions of a county, we did a spatial overlay of the census tracts onto city and town boundaries using a geographic information system to properly assign each census tract to its appropriate city or town. Then we named each census tract to the local colloquially recognized neighborhood name for that spot (e.g., Boston, MA (Dorchester). If there was not a name available, we named the census tract by the largest street intersection in the census tract (e.g., Worcester, MA (Lincoln St/Plantation St)
Why we don't use Zip Codes as neighborhoods
Zip codes were developed by the Postal Service for the purpose of delivering mail, but were never intended to define coherent neighborhoods. In addition, Zip Codes can have as many as 10 distinctly different census tracts contained within them. When distinct census tracts are blended together in a single Zip Code, the data reflects their average conditions and often gives a false sense of the area. The result is that potentially great matching neighborhoods can be missed, and erroneous matches can also be produced and delivered to you.
Using census tracts makes great matches possible, and helps people find the areas that are best for them and their families. Because we are committed to providing the highest possible quality and finding the neighborhoods that best meet your criteria, we use census tracts. And, as always, we show you the actual street map of the neighborhood so you know exactly where your best matching neighborhood is located.
What is a Condition Alert?
A condition alert is a condition in the neighborhood that triggers an alert. NeighborhoodScout contains condition alerts to highlight conditions that are extreme, whether good or bad. This helps answer crucial questions about the state of the neighborhood being evaluated, such as:
What are the risks of violent crime here?
Is the risk of home break-ins or other property crimes increasing?
Does real estate here hold its value?
Are the trends in local vacancies or unemployment concerning?
...and dozens more.
Information at a glance that you need to know to invest, appraise or finance a property.
Arnoldsburg is a very small town located in the state of West Virginia. With a population of 3,137 people and just one neighborhood, Arnoldsburg is the 65th largest community in West Virginia.
Occupations and Workforce
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Arnoldsburg is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 44.07% of the Arnoldsburg workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Arnoldsburg is a town of sales and office workers, construction workers and builders, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in Arnoldsburg who work in office and administrative support (15.60%), healthcare suport services (11.10%), and sales jobs (7.58%).
Setting & Lifestyle
The town is relatively quiet, having a combination of lower population density and few of those groups of people who have a tendency to be noisy. For example, Arnoldsburg has relatively fewer families with younger children, and/or college students. Combined, this makes Arnoldsburg a pretty quiet place to live overall. If you like quiet, you will probably enjoy it here.
One downside of living in Arnoldsburg, however, is that residents on average have to contend with a long commute, spending on average 35.54 minutes every day commuting to work.
Arnoldsburg is a small town, and as such doesn't have a public transit system that people use to get to and from their jobs every day.
Demographics
The population of Arnoldsburg has one of the lowest overall levels of education in the country: only 4.93% of people over 25 hold a college degree. The national average for all municipalities is 21.84%.
The per capita income in Arnoldsburg in 2022 was $22,860, which is lower middle income relative to West Virginia, and low income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $91,440 for a family of four. However, Arnoldsburg contains both very wealthy and poor people as well. Arnoldsburg also has one of the higher rates of people living in poverty in the nation, with 38.84% of its population below the federal poverty line.
The people who call Arnoldsburg home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Arnoldsburg residents report their race to be White. Important ancestries of people in Arnoldsburg include Irish, English, German, French, and Dutch.
The most common language spoken in Arnoldsburg is English. Other important languages spoken here include Italian and German/Yiddish.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
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 Arnoldsburg, the neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Length of Commute
Regardless of the means by which residents commute, this neighborhood has a length of commute that is notable. 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. 15.4% 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 98.7% of all neighborhoods in America.
People
Of note, 70.3% of the children in this area live in poverty; an extraordinarily high percentage compared to other neighborhoods in the nation. In a nation where approximately one in four children grows up in poverty, this neighborhood stands out for the depth of the problem manifested here.
In addition, neighborhoodScout's exclusive research revealed that 95.1% of the adult residents in the neighborhood do not have a 4-year college degree, which is a lower rate of college graduated adults than found in 97.2% of the neighborhoods in America.
Modes of Transportation
While most Americans do drive to work alone each day, the neighborhood stands out by having 91.3% of commuters doing so, which is a higher proportion of people driving alone to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 97.7% of all American neighborhoods.
Real Estate
The real estate in this neighborhood consists of more mobile homes than 97.1% of all neighborhoods in America, with 37.1% of the occupied housing here being classified as mobile homes. So if you are looking for a mobile home, or you like the look and feel of mobile home parks, this neighborhood might have the setting you desire.
In addition, unpopulated, and rural, the neighborhood is one of the least crowded neighborhoods in all of America. If you like open space, no traffic, and lots of room, this neighborhood may be just what you are looking for. According to NeighborhoodScout's leading research, this neighborhood is less densely populated than 94.7% of the neighborhoods in America.
Occupations
NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research identifies the neighborhood as having one of the highest concentrations of people employed in manufacturing or as laborers of any neighborhood in America. In fact, despite the loss of manufacturing jobs nationally, this neighborhood has 44.1% of its working residents employed in such fields, which is a higher proportion than 96.6% of American neighborhoods.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more French ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 8.5% of this neighborhood's residents have French ancestry.
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 Arnoldsburg are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 94.2% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 70.3% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 98.5% 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 neighborhood, 44.1% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations, with 26.7% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in executive, management, and professional occupations (16.2%), and 13.1% in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 98.9% of households. Some people also speak Italian (4.1%).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
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 Arnoldsburg, WV, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Irish (18.0%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (15.1%), and residents who report German roots (11.3%), and some of the residents are also of French ancestry (8.5%), along with some Dutch ancestry residents (2.6%), 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 (26.6% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America. However, there is also a significant group of residents (15.4%) who commute over an hour in each direction.
Here most residents (91.3%) 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 (7.9%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.
SCOUT’s patented match algorithm identifies the most similar neighborhoods to a subject location, and quantifies the similarity to the subject location. This allows analysts to identify the most similar neighborhoods in a local market area for appraisals, investments, and research.
The algorithm uses 273 neighborhood conditions, identifies the dominant dimensions underlying the conditions and calculates the similarity. This captures the true culture and character of locations, economic conditions, and trends.
The closer to 100% means the locations are nearly identical. 80% is a very good, but not excellent match, and so forth.
