21090Linthicum, Maryland

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 21090.

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
OpportunityTop 8% of 6,210 published ZIP areas80
SchoolsTop 49% of 4,422 published ZIP areas52
Housing affordabilityTop 9% of 6,685 published ZIP areas100
ClimateTop 37% of 6,789 published ZIP areas73
Physical resilienceTop 4% of 6,709 published ZIP areas94
AccessTop 21% of 6,791 published ZIP areas98
Economic stabilityTop 5% of 6,742 published ZIP areas84
The quick read

21090 ranks in the top 8% of published ZIP profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 3.4% and median household income of $138,119.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 18% of median household income and the median home is 3.0 times it.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published ZIP profiles, placing 21090 in the top 4% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
10,652
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$138,119
Top 5% nationally
Density
1,604/sq mi
6.6 sq mi of land
Median age
36.8
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Linthicum
Maryland
Metro area
Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD
Nearest major airport
BWI
2 mi · Baltimore/Washington Intl Thurgood Marshall
Median home value
$410,400
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.4% is lower than 89% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment grew 0.4% over the past year, to 308,887 employed residents.

43% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 82% of measured US ZIP areas.

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

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$9,467$138,119Top 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$3,455$55,969Top 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate3.5%Bottom 12%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute25.6 minBottom 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher42.8%Top 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment308,887Top 16%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-0.5%Bottom 42%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.4%Top 23%June 2026
Labor force319,879Top 16%June 2026
Labor force participation72.7%Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$76,370Top 23%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$59,070Top 20%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.2%Bottom 36%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.4%Bottom 11%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
2021202220232024138k107k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $138,119 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 — Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
General and Operations Managers44,960$117,040
Retail Salespersons39,920$34,800
Registered Nurses30,930$99,550
Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive29,780$49,220
Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand28,350$43,250
Home Health and Personal Care Aides26,880$37,640

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.

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

10% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 24% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 12.9 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
3
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
12.9
across all schools here
Math proficiency
9.7%
Bottom 40% in Maryland
Reading proficiency
24.2%
Top 48% in Maryland
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Lindale MiddleAnne Arundel County Public Schools88412.83%27%
Linthicum ElementaryAnne Arundel County Public Schools50914.525%25%
Overlook ElementaryAnne Arundel County Public Schools24910.85%12%

53.5% 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 Maryland’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 $2,055 takes 18% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.0 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
17.9%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.0×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$2,055
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$410,400
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income2.97Bottom 46%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate83.2%Top 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±3444,255Top 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$172$2,055Top 7%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$17,993$410,400Top 19%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income17.9%Top 48%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate6.5%Bottom 30%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 89°F and January a low of 25°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 45.0 inches, including 19.3 inches of snow.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station BALTIMORE WASH INTL AP, 3.1 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.5"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation45.0"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall19.3"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low25°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high89°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing44°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

94 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are hurricane, earthquake and cold wave.

HurricaneModerate
EarthquakeModerate
LandslideModerate
DroughtModerate
Coastal floodingModerate
Cold waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, lightning, heat wave, strong wind, tornado, inland flooding, hail, ice storm, 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.

Anne Arundel County records 2.4 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, lower than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 6.9 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 17.8 per 100,000 residents in Anne Arundel County.

Homicide
2.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
6.9
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
17.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
8.7
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 Anne Arundel 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 21090 rather than 21090 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

4 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 2 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Baltimore/Washington Intl Thurgood MarshallBWI2 mi10,503 ft
Washington Dulles IntlIAD46 mi11,500 ft
Harrisburg IntlMDT68 mi10,001 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
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
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.

21090 vs Linthicum

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

21090
Linthicum
Median household income
$138,119
vs
$134,673
Per capita income
$55,969
vs
$54,896
Population density
1,604/sq mi
vs
2,071/sq mi
Median home value
$410,400
vs
$401,600
Median gross rent
$2,055
vs
$2,066
Homeownership rate
83.2%
vs
83.4%
Bachelor's degree or higher
42.8%
vs
41.0%
Poverty rate
3.5%
vs
3.3%
Median age
36.8
vs
37.7

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.