Easton, Pennsylvania
Area Profile
29,739 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Easton, in Northampton County.
Unemployment is 4.7% and median household income $69,348, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published city profiles.
In the public schools here, 22% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 12.7 students for every teacher.
Residential permitting has slowed: 1 units authorized over the past twelve months, 50% below the prior year.
These sentences are written by fixed rules from the measurements below — a statement appears because a number crossed a stated threshold, and the values behind it are stored with it. No figure anywhere on this site is invented, estimated or inferred to fill a gap. How this works.
At a glance
Jobs & opportunity
Unemployment of 4.7% is lower than 36% of the 3,904 measured US cities.
Employment grew 3.3% over the past year, to 15,546 employed residents.
| Metric | Value | Compared nationally | Source period |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median household income ±$6,783 | $69,348 | Top 47%of 29,463 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Per capita income ±$1,834 | $29,811 | Bottom 36%of 31,420 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Poverty rate | 16.3% | Top 32%of 31,900 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Average commute | 28.5 min | Top 41%of 31,543 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Bachelor's degree or higher | 28.2% | Top 33%of 31,919 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Employment | 15,546 | Bottom 16%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Employment change (3 years) | 3.6% | Top 11%of 3,903 | June 2026 |
| Employment change (year over year) | 3.3% | Top 1%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Labor force | 16,321 | Bottom 16%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Labor force participation | 63.7% | Top 39%of 31,933 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Mean annual wage | $64,090 | Bottom 27%of 3,658 | 2025 OEWS |
| Median annual wage | $48,990 | Bottom 34%of 3,658 | 2025 OEWS |
| Unemployment change (year over year) | 0.7% | Top 19%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Unemployment rate | 4.7% | Top 36%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Occupation | People employed | Median annual wage |
|---|---|---|
| Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand | 14,840 | $42,380 |
| Home Health and Personal Care Aides | 12,030 | $30,380 |
| Registered Nurses | 10,860 | $101,440 |
| Stockers and Order Fillers | 9,880 | $38,950 |
| Fast Food and Counter Workers | 9,110 | $29,090 |
| Retail Salespersons | 9,060 | $32,310 |
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.
Schools
How it’s calculated →22% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 42% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.
There are 12.7 students for every full-time teacher across 9 public schools, fewer than in most measured places.
| School | District | Students | Per teacher | Math | Reading |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wilson Area HS | Wilson Area SD | 709 | 15.4 | — | — |
| Wilson Area Intermediate Sch | Wilson Area SD | 643 | 13.1 | 15% | 58% |
| Paxinosa El Sch | Easton Area SD | 572 | 11.4 | 10% | 16% |
| Cheston El Sch | Easton Area SD | 559 | 13.0 | 23% | 29% |
| March El Sch | Easton Area SD | 296 | 11.4 | 33% | 48% |
| Wilson Borough El Sch | Wilson Area SD | 285 | 11.9 | 38% | 51% |
| Easton Arts Academy Elementary CS · charter | Easton Arts Academy Elementary CS | 254 | 9.8 | 14% | 41% |
| Williams Township El Sch | Wilson Area SD | 249 | 13.1 | 40% | 70% |
| Avona El Sch | Wilson Area SD | 205 | 15.8 | 25% | 50% |
71.7% 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 Pennsylvania’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 →Prices for everything a household buys run about 1% below the national average — the Bureau of Economic Analysis index reads 98.9, against 100 for the nation. Housing drives most of that difference.
A new two-bedroom lease runs about $1,670, some 26% above the $1,325 tenants already here pay — the market has moved faster than sitting tenancies have.
Median rent of $1,325 takes 23% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.
A median home at $196,300 costs 2.8 times the median household income of $69,348, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.
Prices here run about 1% below the national average. The spread between places is driven mostly by housing — goods vary far less — and this excludes taxes.
| Metric | Value | Compared nationally | Source period |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost of living index | 98.9 | Bottom 41%of 3,658 | 2023 |
| Home price to income | 2.83 | Bottom 48%of 27,972 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Homeownership rate | 44.5% | Bottom 6%of 31,717 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Housing units ±456 | 11,364 | Top 5%of 32,177 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Market rent, one bedroom | $1,370 | Bottom 47%of 4,067 | FY2026 |
| Market rent, three bedroom | $2,130 | Bottom 48%of 4,067 | FY2026 |
| Market rent, two bedroom | $1,670 | Bottom 49%of 4,067 | FY2026 |
| Median gross rent ±$57 | $1,325 | Top 27%of 23,329 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Median home value ±$15,999 | $196,300 | Top 48%of 29,342 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Rent as a share of income | 22.9% | Top 25%of 22,804 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Vacancy rate | 8.9% | Bottom 46%of 31,872 | 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 →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 grown 8% since 2020, reaching 30,432 in 2024.
Permit activity fell in each of the 3 calendar years through 2025.
New construction is predominantly single-family: of 1 units permitted over the past twelve months, none were in buildings of five or more homes.
At 0.0 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.
Weather & climate
5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 86°F and January a low of 22°F.
Normal annual precipitation is 47.4 inches, including 33.1 inches of snow.
Air quality measures a median index of 39, in the Good band, and one day a year passes 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.
| Metric | Value | Source period |
|---|---|---|
| 90th percentile air quality index | 58.0 | 2024 calendar year |
| Annual precipitation | 47.4" | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Annual snowfall | 33.1" | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Average January low | 22°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Average July high | 86°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Comfortable months | 5 | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Days above AQI 100 | 1 | 2024 calendar year |
| Median air quality index | 39.0 | 2024 calendar year |
| Seasonal temperature swing | 45°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
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 modeled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — a little over half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and about a fifth of all US counties do, 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
The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, hurricane and earthquake, with inland flooding alone responsible for 70% of it.
Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, heat wave, cold wave, tornado, ice storm, drought, avalanche, wildfire, hail, coastal flooding.
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.
Safety
How it’s measured →Below these are deaths rather than offenses, published for the county. The two measure different things and are not comparable with each other.
Easton's police department reported 167 violent offenses per 100,000 residents, near the middle of places with a department reporting. Property crime runs at 673.
Northampton County records 1.6 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 7.5 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.
Drug overdose deaths run at 10.7 per 100,000 residents in Northampton County.
Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.
Offenses are reported to the FBI by Easton’s own police department, for the population it serves, and are shown only where it reported every month of the year — a partial year is withheld rather than scaled up. Reported crime counts what was reported to and recorded by police, which is not the same as what happened, and a place that draws a large daytime workforce carries incidents its residents did not generate. Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Northampton County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city center and a quiet suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Easton rather than Easton 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
Some things people look for are not on this page, and each is absent for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.
- Taxes
- Taxes are not published: no source covers them nationally with a method open enough to check. Cost of living now is — the index above is the Bureau of Economic Analysis price parity for this area — but it is a price level for all consumption rather than a budget for a household, its spread is driven mostly by housing, and it excludes taxes. Housing affordability is computed separately from rent, price and income, because that answers a narrower and more actionable question. Nothing here is individualized 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 neighborhood all vary within the places measured here.
Access
6 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest Newark Liberty Intl at 55 miles.
| Airport | Code | Distance | Longest runway |
|---|---|---|---|
| Newark Liberty Intl | EWR | 55 mi | 9,999 ft |
| Philadelphia Intl | PHL | 56 mi | 12,000 ft |
| John F Kennedy Intl | JFK | 76 mi | 14,511 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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Other cities in Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton, PA-NJ
Same metropolitan area, measured the same way| City | County | Population | Area Score | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Allentown | Lehigh County | 125,976 | 60 | vs Easton |
| Bethlehem | Northampton County | 77,956 | 65 | vs Easton |
| Fullerton | Lehigh County | 16,724 | — | vs Easton |
| Phillipsburg | Warren County | 15,299 | 61 | vs Easton |
| Emmaus | Lehigh County | 11,889 | 71 | vs Easton |
| Northampton | Northampton County | 10,400 | 66 | vs Easton |
| Hackettstown | Warren County | 10,140 | 68 | vs Easton |
Every city here is measured on the same scale from the same source releases, so the comparison is like for like. A higher Area Score reflects AreaProfile’s standardized weighting rather than a judgment about which is the better place to live.
Similar places
Matched on AreaProfile signals, not geographyCompare
Put Easton side by side with a similar place.
Data & methodology
| Used for | Source | Source period | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access | Federal Aviation Administration Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service | NASR current cycle | 28-day NASR cycle |
| Safety | Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime Data Explorer Summarized offense counts by law enforcement agency | 2025 calendar year | Annually, with monthly revisions |
| Physical risk | Federal Emergency Management Agency National Risk Index | National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0) | Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current) |
| Climate | NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly) | 1991-2020 Normals | Every ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period) |
| Housing | U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis Regional price parities and county personal income | 2023 | Annually, each December |
| Jobs | U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Local Area Unemployment Statistics | June 2026 | Monthly |
| Jobs | U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics | 2025 OEWS | Annual (spring release) |
| Demographics, Housing, Income, Jobs | U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File) | 2024 ACS 5-Year | Annual (5-year estimates released each December) |
| Development | U.S. Census Bureau Building Permits Survey | 12 months ending July 2026 | Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month |
| Demographics | U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program | July 1, 2024 estimate | Annual (vintage released each spring) |
| Safety | U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics Provisional county-level mortality by intent | April 2025 to March 2026 | Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years |
| Schools | U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments | 2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school year | Directory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them |
| Housing | U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy Development and Research Fair Market Rents | FY2026 | Annually, each October for the coming fiscal year |
| Climate | U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System Daily Air Quality Index by county | 2024 calendar year | Annually, 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.
ZIP codes in Easton
1 published ZIP profiles| ZIP | Population | Median household income | Area Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18042 | 45,532 | $77,556 | 63 |