Amsterdam, New York

Area Profile

18,166 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Amsterdam, in Montgomery County.

53out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 22% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity2480th of 3,904 published cities50
Schools2008th of 2,668 published cities32
Growth2703rd of 2,973 published cities22
Housing affordabilityTop 27% of 4,223 published cities92
Climate3601st of 4,223 published cities60
Physical resilience2284th of 4,182 published cities53
Access2406th of 4,226 published cities90
Economic stability3719th of 4,226 published cities35
The quick read

Unemployment is 4.1% and median household income $56,178, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published city profiles.

In the public schools here, 29% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 14.0 students for every teacher.

Rent takes 21% of median household income here, below the 30% threshold conventionally called cost-burdened, and the median home is 2.5 times that income.

At a glance

Population
18,166
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$56,178
Bottom 33% nationally
Density
3,093/sq mi
5.9 sq mi of land
Median age
39.5
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Montgomery County
New York
Metro area
Amsterdam, NY
Nearest major airport
ALB
24 mi · Albany Intl
Median home value
$137,900
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.1% is lower than 59% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 0.9% over the past year, to 22,039 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$8,192$56,178Bottom 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,588$31,224Bottom 41%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate20.2%Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute22.8 minBottom 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher22.5%Top 45%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment22,039Bottom 28%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.1%Top 46%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-0.9%Bottom 45%June 2026
Labor force22,980Bottom 28%June 2026
Labor force participation62.0%Top 45%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.4%Top 37%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.1%Bottom 41%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202456k43k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $56,178 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 publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Montgomery County, NY, which contains this city.

29% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 44% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 14.0 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
7
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
14.0
across all schools here
Math proficiency
29.2%
Bottom 25% in New York
Reading proficiency
43.6%
Bottom 19% in New York
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
AMSTERDAM HIGH SCHOOLAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT1,19215.1
BROADALBIN-PERTH ELEMENTARY SCHOOLBROADALBIN-PERTH CENTRAL SCHOOL DISTRICT87911.647%55%
WILBUR H LYNCH LITERACY ACADEMYAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT77212.13%42%
RAPHAEL J MCNULTY ACADEMY FOR INTERN STUDIES & LITERACYAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT50315.722%28%
WILLIAM B TECLER ARTS IN EDUCATIONAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT46516.628%38%
MARIE CURIE INSTITUTE OF ENGINEERING AND COMMUNICATIONAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT44618.641%37%
WILLIAM H BARKLEY MICROSOCIETYAMSTERDAM CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT28513.642%58%

68.8% 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 New York’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 $1,006 takes 21% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.5 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
21.5%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.5×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,006
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$137,900
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income2.45Bottom 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate53.0%Bottom 12%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±3039,367Top 6%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$45$1,006Top 47%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$11,186$137,900Bottom 34%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income21.5%Top 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate18.0%Top 27%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 →
Development Momentum
22/ 100
Ranks 2703 of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing — 3 consecutive years, measured from 2022 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 18,169 in 2024.

Permit activity has fallen for 3 consecutive years.

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

At 0.1 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
1
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.1
Bottom 6% nationally
Year over year
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202418k18k
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
2022202320242025460.0
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2022 (−100%).

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 84°F and January a low of 16°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 40.7 inches, including 59.2 inches of snow.

0°20°40°60°80°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station ALBANY AP, 23.7 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.5"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation40.7"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall59.2"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low16°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high84°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing49°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

53 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, hurricane and heat wave.

Inland floodingElevated
LandslideModerate
HurricaneModerate
Heat waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, ice storm, cold wave, lightning, earthquake, tornado, hail, strong wind, wildfire, avalanche.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. City values are the population-weighted mean of the counties the city overlaps, using AreaProfile place-to-county land-area weights. 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.

Montgomery County records 2.5 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 6.8 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 14.4 per 100,000 residents in Montgomery County.

Homicide
2.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
6.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
14.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
13.6
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 Montgomery 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 Amsterdam rather than Amsterdam 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

5 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 24 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Albany IntlALB24 mi8,500 ft
Griffiss IntlRME65 mi11,820 ft
Westfield-Barnes RgnlBAF93 mi9,000 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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Area Score
53
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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.

ZIP codes in Amsterdam

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
1201027,750$63,69655