Every workday, about 1,600 people come to Spencer for work
Most working residents leave Spencer for work: only 5% work in town. The top destinations are Toledo (30%), Springfield (6%) and Sylvania (5%). Half commute less than 12 miles.
What kind of work town is Spencer?
Read from the numbers below. The page puts what stands out first.
Spencer makes things: 76% of its jobs are in goods
1,604 jobs are based in Spencer. Here is what they are, next to the jobs Spencer’s own residents hold wherever they work.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Spencer, 2013 → 2023: 1,535 → 1,604. Big swings can come from how a large employer reports its locations, not only from real openings or closings.
Primary jobs covered by unemployment insurance (not the self-employed). Pay is monthly earnings. LEHD 2023.
Where Spencer’s workers come from
A thicker line means more commuters. Switch between where residents work and where the people who work here live.
Where Spencer clocks in
30% of workers
6% of workers
5% of workersLines run between town centers. The top 10 towns each way; “Everywhere else” is the rest, including other states.
Spencer nearly doubles on a workday
On a workday 777 residents head out to work, 37 work right here, and 1,567 people come in from elsewhere.
About 2,000 people are in Spencer on a workday afternoon, 63% more than live here.
2.0 jobs for every working resident, so more people commute in than out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
Half of Spencer commutes less than 12 miles
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
About 16% show a job over 50 miles away. Some of that is real, and some is employers that report every worker at a head office, so a few long commutes are on paper only.
Straight-line distance from each worker’s home block to their main job’s block. LEHD 2023.
About 26 minutes each way, longer than most of Ohio
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 8.4 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Spencer workers work from home, vs 13% across Ohio. Their commute is the hallway.
Spencer and the towns next door
The biggest share goes to Springfield (6%). Darker towns draw more of Spencer’s workers. Tap a town to see its commute.
Average commute minutes, one way
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Every worker, home to work. The 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 says. A 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 surveys. Flows, distances and jobs: LEHD 2023. Commute time, working from home and working out of state: the Census American Community Survey.
- Straight lines. Distances are as the crow flies between home and work. Roads, rivers and traffic make the real trip longer.
More of Spencer
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Spencer, from the people who make the trip.
Your answer becomes a post in Town Square.
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2023, primary jobs. Commute time, working from home and working out of state: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates. Distances are straight lines between home and work; real drives run longer.