Monroe County, IL

County Profile

35,036 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Monroe County, IL.

Several figures AreaProfile publishes are measured by county and nowhere finer — death rates by intent among them. On this page those describe the geography they are printed on, which is not true of the city and ZIP pages that inherit them.

77out of 100
Area Score
Top 5% of 1,225 profiles measured

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 10% of 1,255 counties measured79
SchoolsTop 4% of 973 counties measured88
Growth683rd of 1,226 counties measured47
Housing affordabilityTop 22% of 1,255 counties measured100
ClimateTop 34% of 1,254 counties measured72
Physical resilienceTop 37% of 1,255 counties measured70
Access629th of 1,255 counties measured81
Economic stabilityTop 4% of 1,255 counties measured94
The quick read

Monroe County ranks in the top 10% of published profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 3.0% and median household income of $102,880.

Rent takes 12% of median household income here, below the 30% threshold conventionally called cost-burdened, and the median home is 2.7 times that income.

A typical July reaches 89°F and a typical January falls to 24°F, on thirty-year normals.

At a glance

Population
35,036
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$102,880
Top 5% nationally
Density
91/sq mi
385.3 sq mi of land
Median age
43.2
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Monroe County
Illinois
Metro area
St. Louis, MO-IL
Nearest major airport
STL
34 mi · St Louis Lambert Intl
Median home value
$282,100
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.0% is lower than 94% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment held steady over the past year, at 18,920 employed residents.

39% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 90% of measured US locations.

Household income is higher than at least 95% of measured US locations.

MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Median household income ±$5,432$102,880Top 5%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,904$49,605Top 7%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate5.0%Bottom 1%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute30.1 minTop 23%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher38.7%Top 10%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Employment18,920Bottom 21%of 1,255June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-0.9%Bottom 34%of 1,255June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-0.0%Top 32%of 1,255June 2026
Labor force19,501Bottom 21%of 1,255June 2026
Labor force participation68.3%Top 7%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.0%Bottom 45%of 1,255June 2026
Unemployment rate3.0%Bottom 6%of 1,255June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/063.52.4
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 3.0% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
2021202220232024103k93k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $102,880 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — St. Louis, MO-IL
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
General and Operations Managers46,410$93,140
Home Health and Personal Care Aides44,200$34,490
Registered Nurses35,200$83,180
Cashiers31,130$32,380
Retail Salespersons29,750$33,820
Stockers and Order Fillers28,940$37,840

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

40% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 43% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 15.5 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
14
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
15.5
across all schools here
Math proficiency
39.6%
Top 1% in Illinois
Reading proficiency
42.5%
Top 1% in Illinois
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Waterloo High SchoolWaterloo CUSD 587617.2
Waterloo Junior High SchoolWaterloo CUSD 561317.037%52%
Columbia Middle SchoolColumbia CUSD 461216.529%30%
Columbia High SchoolColumbia CUSD 460616.4
W J Zahnow Elem SchoolWaterloo CUSD 548714.8
Parkview Elementary SchoolColumbia CUSD 442714.750%45%
Rogers Elem SchoolWaterloo CUSD 541716.057%47%
Gardner Elementary SchoolWaterloo CUSD 537416.339%52%
Eagleview Elementary SchoolColumbia CUSD 425912.3
Valmeyer Elementary SchoolValmeyer CUSD 315211.726%24%
Valmeyer High SchoolValmeyer CUSD 310610.6
Valmeyer Jr HighValmeyer CUSD 37711.015%25%

18.9% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Illinois’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,042 takes 12% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.7 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
12.2%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.7×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,042
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$282,100
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Home price to income2.74Bottom 40%of 3,2192024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate84.7%Top 4%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±3214,759Top 45%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$61$1,042Top 27%of 3,2162024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$13,470$282,100Top 22%of 3,2192024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income12.2%Bottom 5%of 3,2162024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate6.2%Bottom 10%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
47/ 100
Ranks 683 of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing, measured from 2020 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has been broadly flat since 2020, at 34,969 in 2024.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 0% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 2.2 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
78
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
2.2
Bottom 39% nationally
Year over year
+32%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202435k35k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
20202021202220232024202512662
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2020 (−48%).

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 89°F and January a low of 24°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 40.8 inches.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station CAHOKIA ST LOUIS AP, 20.3 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.8"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation40.8"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low24°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high89°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing47°F1991-2020 Normals

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today.

Physical risk

70 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, earthquake and strong wind.

EarthquakeElevated
Strong windElevated
HailModerate
Cold waveModerate
Winter weatherModerate
Inland floodingModerate

Low or minimal exposure: heat wave, landslide, tornado, drought, lightning, ice storm, hurricane, wildfire.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA National Risk Index county record. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Monroe County records 5.7 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 15.3 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 15.4 per 100,000 residents in Monroe County.

Homicide
5.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
15.3
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
15.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
16.1
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Monroe County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Monroe County rather than Monroe County itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
Offences reported to police are published by department rather than by town, and only where a department reported every month of the year. No municipal department reports for this place — many smaller communities are policed by the county — so there is no figure to show. A partial year is never scaled up to look complete, and arrest counts or news volume are never substituted for it.
Taxes and full cost of living
No public source publishes either with national coverage and a method open enough to check. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings. Nothing here is individualised tax advice.
Anything about a specific address
Every figure describes an area, not a street or a house. School attendance zones, insurance pricing and the character of a neighbourhood all vary within the places measured here.

Access

3 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 34 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
St Louis Lambert IntlSTL34 mi11,020 ft
St Louis RgnlALN43 mi8,099 ft
Veterans Airport of Southern IllinoisMWA73 mi8,012 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
77
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Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.