Work & commute · St. Charles

Work & commute in St. Charles, MO

Most working residents leave St. Charles for work: only 13% work in town. The top destinations are St. Louis (9%), St. Peters (7%) and Maryland Heights (6%). Half commute less than 10 miles.

Census LEHD commute flows, 2023 Census ACS commute times

Work in town

13%

4,680 of 35,144 working residents

Typical commute

10 mi

Half commute less than this, straight-line

Average commute time

22 min

One way, from the Census survey

Work from home

18%

of workers, from the Census survey

Coming and going

Who leaves, who stays, who comes in

On a workday 30,464 St. Charles residents head out of town to work, 4,680 work right here, and 30,233 people come in from elsewhere to fill jobs in St. Charles.

30,464live here, work elsewhere

4,680live and work here

30,233work here, live elsewhere

Leave for workStayCome in

The map

Where St. Charles goes to work

St. Charles (in town)right here

13%4,680

St. Louis18.3 mi away

9%3,220

St. Peters4.9 mi away

7%2,419

Maryland Heights5.9 mi away

6%2,062

O'Fallon11.2 mi away

5%1,826

Chesterfield10.1 mi away

5%1,587

Creve Coeur10 mi away

4%1,371

Berkeley10.2 mi away

4%1,247

Bridgeton5.5 mi away

3%989

Clayton14.5 mi away

2%822

Everywhere elseother towns and states

42%14,921

Lines run between town centers; a thicker line means more commuters. The top 10 towns each way.

How far

How far St. Charles commutes

Straight-line distance from home to work, for every working resident. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.

47%

43%

47%Under 10 mi

43%10–24 mi

3%25–50 mi

7%Over 50 mi

Job hub or commuter town?

St. Charles is balanced between jobs and homes

0.99jobs per working resident

Balanced

About as many jobs as working residents (0.99 per resident).

The jobs

What the jobs in St. Charles are

34,913 jobs are based in St. Charles. Here is what they are, next to the jobs St. Charles’s own residents hold wherever they work.

Jobs based in St. Charles

34,913 jobs

Goods (factories, building, farms)15%

Trade, transport & utilities24%

Services (health, schools, offices…)61%

$1,250 a month or less15%

$1,251–$3,333 a month26%

Over $3,333 a month59%

Jobs St. Charles residents hold

35,144 working residents

Goods (factories, building, farms)16%

Trade, transport & utilities21%

Services (health, schools, offices…)63%

$1,250 a month or less12%

$1,251–$3,333 a month23%

Over $3,333 a month65%

+15%

Jobs based in St. Charles, 2013 → 2023: 30,299 → 34,913. Big swings can come from how a large employer reports its locations, not only from real openings or closings.

About these numbers

How to read this page

Every worker, home to workThe Census links each worker’s home block to their main job’s block, for jobs covered by unemployment insurance. That’s most jobs, but not the self-employed.

Where the employer saysA job counts where the employer reports it. Some big employers report one address for many sites, which can make a few commutes look longer than they are.

Two surveysFlows, distances and jobs: LEHD 2023. Commute time and working from home: the Census American Community Survey.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2023, primary jobs; American Community Survey 5-year estimates.