42134Franklin, Kentucky

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 42134.

Area Score unavailable

Missing required signal: growth. AreaProfile withholds a score rather than inferring the missing dimensions.

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity6141st of 6,210 published ZIP areas16
Schools2907th of 4,422 published ZIP areas39
Housing affordabilityTop 42% of 6,685 published ZIP areas85
ClimateTop 32% of 6,789 published ZIP areas74
Physical resilienceTop 44% of 6,709 published ZIP areas64
Access5605th of 6,791 published ZIP areas76
Economic stability5213th of 6,742 published ZIP areas43
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published ZIP profiles: unemployment is 5.7% and the Opportunity signal places 42134 in the bottom 1%.

In the public schools here, 29% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 16.4 students for every teacher.

Rent takes 20% of median household income here, below the 30% threshold conventionally called cost-burdened, and the median home is 3.8 times that income.

At a glance

Population
19,380
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$59,113
Bottom 28% nationally
Density
91/sq mi
212.7 sq mi of land
Median age
38.7
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Franklin
Kentucky
Metro area
Franklin, KY
Nearest major airport
BNA
42 mi · Nashville Intl
Median home value
$226,800
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 5.7% is lower than 12% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment fell 5.8% over the past year, to 8,099 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$3,195$59,113Bottom 28%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,256$30,926Bottom 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate15.8%Top 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute22.7 minBottom 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher18.9%Bottom 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment8,099Bottom 1%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-4.9%Bottom 4%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-5.8%Bottom 1%June 2026
Labor force8,593Bottom 1%June 2026
Labor force participation59.2%Bottom 44%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.8%Top 15%June 2026
Unemployment rate5.7%Top 12%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202459k53k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $59,113 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.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish labor-force data for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Franklin, KY, the city containing this ZIP code.

29% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 39% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 16.4 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
4
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
16.4
across all schools here
Math proficiency
29.4%
Bottom 42% in Kentucky
Reading proficiency
38.5%
Bottom 34% in Kentucky
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Simpson Elementary SchoolSimpson County73116.227%27%
Franklin-Simpson Middle SchoolSimpson County66218.432%47%
Lincoln Elementary SchoolSimpson County46314.529%45%
Franklin Elementary SchoolSimpson County32416.2

66.1% 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 Kentucky’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 $1,002 takes 20% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.8 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
20.3%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.8×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,002
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$226,800
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.84Top 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate65.3%Bottom 22%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±1978,326Top 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$77$1,002Bottom 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$24,568$226,800Top 48%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income20.3%Top 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate7.8%Bottom 37%2024 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 →

No building-permit activity is published for this location by the Census Building Permits Survey.

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 90°F and January a low of 28°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 50.1 inches, including 8.5 inches of snow.

Air quality measures a median index of 43, in the Good band, and no day in the year passed 100.

20°40°60°80°100°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station BOWLING GREEN WARREN CO AP, 18.2 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND5.0"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index58.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation50.1"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall8.5"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low28°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high90°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index43.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing42°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
43
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
58
90th percentile index
Days above 100
0
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

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. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

64 / 100
Physical resilience

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

Overall hazard risk is lower than 88% of measured US ZIP areas.

HailHigh
EarthquakeElevated
Ice stormModerate
Strong windModerate
LightningModerate

Low or minimal exposure: tornado, cold wave, drought, heat wave, winter weather, hurricane, inland flooding, landslide, wildfire.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. ZIP values are the land-area-weighted mean of the counties the ZIP Code Tabulation Area intersects. Expected annual loss is not allocated below county level. 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.

Simpson County records 0.0 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, lower than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Drug overdose deaths run at 14.5 per 100,000 residents in Simpson County.

Homicide
0.0
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
0.0
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
14.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
0.0
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 Simpson 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 42134 rather than 42134 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
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. 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.

Access

3 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 42 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Nashville IntlBNA42 mi11,030 ft
SmyrnaMQY50 mi8,038 ft
Owensboro/Daviess County RgnlOWB77 mi8,000 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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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)
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
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

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.

42134 vs Franklin

How this ZIP area compares with Franklin as a whole. Both figures come from the same ACS release, so the comparison is like for like.

42134
Franklin
Median household income
$59,113
vs
$59,052
Per capita income
$30,926
vs
$27,990
Population density
91/sq mi
vs
687/sq mi
Median home value
$226,800
vs
$195,400
Median gross rent
$1,002
vs
$1,010
Homeownership rate
65.3%
vs
55.0%
Bachelor's degree or higher
18.9%
vs
15.5%
Poverty rate
15.8%
vs
17.1%
Median age
38.7
vs
35.8

Some demographic statistics use Census ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, which approximate but do not exactly match USPS ZIP delivery geography. See the methodology for how AreaProfile maps between them.