Side-by-side metrics and state or size-class ranks use the same Census and FBI fields shown on this profile. Results stay in the URL so you can bookmark or share them.
Place dossier plate
SheetMI-ESCANABA-MI · Escanaba, MI 12,374 pop · income 8th pct · 13 tracts
Instrument codes from this place’s ACS population and household income, BEA state COL, FBI safety, national income percentile, photo-finish peer city, home-value band, and matched Census-tract book - not a moving recommendation.
Income neighbourhood around Escanaba
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Escanaba on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Taft · lowest
40,161
Taft · lowest
40,161 median HH income
36.9% of the leader · rank #1
Wofford Heigh… · near
40,168
Wofford Heigh… · near
40,168 median HH income
36.9% of the leader · rank #2
Escanaba · this city
40,169
Escanaba · this city
40,169 median HH income
36.9% of the leader · rank #3
Big River · near
40,179
Big River · near
40,179 median HH income
36.9% of the leader · rank #4
Sebeka · near
40,179
Sebeka · near
40,179 median HH income
36.9% of the leader · rank #5
Eureka · highest
108,947
Eureka · highest
108,947 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
What this shows Neighbourhood peers only - not a full nationwide city board. Open a near peer when the gap is small; open the poles when the spread is wide.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by population, income, and FBI crime rate
Out-of-state nearest neighbors for Escanaba on ACS population and median household income
, plus FBI UCR reporting rate when the extract covers this place. Link sets are deduped so each column is a distinct comparison path, not a forecast that peers share a labor market or climate.
Similar population
Nearest out-of-state cities by ACS population. This city: 12,374.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Escanaba - the verdict
Nationally, Escanaba sits in the 8th percentile for household income and the 25th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
8th
percentile, household income
16th
percentile, home value
32nd
percentile, median rent
25th
percentile, safety
📝 How we sourced this
Population, income, and housing-cost figures come from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-year estimates (B-series tables). Crime data uses FBI UCR; climate uses NOAA Climate Normals; school counts come from NCES Common Core of Data; permits use the Census Building Permits Survey (BPS). See our methodology page for the full ETL pipeline and OMB / FIPS join keys.
Data Snapshot: Escanaba, MI
12,374 people live in Escanaba, Michigan - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. The typical household in Escanaba brings in $40,169 a year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 13.9%. Escanaba's housing stock carries a median value of $116,600, and the median resident age is 43.5 years. 18.9% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 47.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Crime here tracks close to the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 2353.7 incidents per 100,000 residents, near the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). The annual average temperature per NOAA climate normals runs 42.2°F with 28.8 inches of precipitation per year and 46.9 inches of snowfall.
Living costs in Michigan run below the national norm: the state registers 96.2 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Below Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,113 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $238 across Michigan, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. The average commute for Escanaba workers runs 10.6 minutes, with 74.7% driving alone and 4.9% working from home. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 49.6 out of 100 (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Escanaba's data
How this reading path is ordered
This is not a composite city score. It is a city-specific route through the available public records, ordered for this profile so the page starts with questions the joined data can actually answer. The route here runs from comparison shortlist to work and mobility to housing and income to schools and households to reported crime to climate and hazard context to within-city variation to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Escanaba, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, within-city Census tract profiles, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for local building permits; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Comparison shortlist
Which cities make useful reference points for Escanaba?
Use the in-state set to hold state policy and broad price conditions more nearly constant. Use the nationwide size set to ask whether cities with a similar resident count produce different housing, income, or commute outcomes. The income set is a third lens, deliberately separate from population matching. The nationwide peer panel below adds a fourth FBI UCR reporting-rate lens, not personal risk.
Within Michigan, the closest population matches are Riverview (12,269 residents, $71,783 income); Melvindale (12,605 residents, $41,356 income); New Baltimore (12,060 residents, $97,027 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Justice, IL (12,372 residents); Palmer, MA (12,372 residents); Eureka, MO (12,371 residents). A third, income-matched reference set of 6 out-of-state cities sits in the income neighbourhood chart near the Place Dossier plate. These are mechanical peer sets, not claims that the places share a labor market, climate, culture, or metro context.
What does the journey to work look like in Escanaba?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 74.7%. The reported mean trip to work is 10.6 minutes.
Mode share answers how workers usually travel; it does not measure congestion, reliability, distance to a particular job, or the quality of transit service. No single mode completely explains the work trip here. The mix is more useful than a one-number commute grade, especially when comparing places where transit, walking, and remote work divide the non-driving share differently.
How far does income reach against housing in Escanaba?
This is a citywide price-to-income reference, not a mortgage-affordability test; it does not include interest rates, taxes, insurance, household size, or an individual buyer's down payment. Income and home value move within the same broad scale here. The useful next check is not a generic affordability label, but whether similar-size cities offer a materially different income, housing, or commute trade-off.
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 2.9 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 13.9%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
PlainCities matches 13 Census tracts to this city.
That layer breaks the citywide income, rent, and home-value medians into smaller Census geographies, which can reveal differences that one municipal median necessarily hides. A tract is a statistical area, not a locally defined neighborhood or a promise about conditions on a particular block. Start with the city profile for the broad comparison, then use the tract layer to test whether the same housing and income pattern is consistent across the city. Large within-city spreads are a reason to avoid treating any citywide median as a universal resident experience.
These joined records add useful context, but they do not need another full-size panel. Each remains a separate measure with its own geography and source boundary.
Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Escanaba?
The matched institution count is small, so district boundaries and schools outside the city line may matter more than the municipal count suggests. Use the number as a coverage cue, then verify attendance zones with the district before making a household decision.
The NCES join finds 1 public school within the city match. 18.9% of adults age 25+ hold a bachelor's degree or higher in the ACS estimate. These measures answer different questions: the school count describes local institutions, while adult attainment describes residents and cannot be used as a school-quality rating.
Poverty estimate
13.9%
Bachelor's degree+
18.9%
Matched public schools
1
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Escanaba?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 2353.7 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, near the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 3% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Treat this as a reporting-rate comparison, not a prediction of personal risk or a neighborhood-level safety grade. Tourism, daytime population, reporting practices, and variation inside the city are not adjusted away. The state rank and same-state peer table are the narrower comparisons available on this page.
Total reported rate
2353.7
Violent rate
357.1
Property rate
1996.6
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
The two sources should not be blended into one comfort or safety score. Use the climate values for baseline conditions and the risk index as a prompt to inspect specific hazards, insurance, and local emergency guidance for a particular address.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 42.2°F, with 28.8 inches of precipitation and 46.9 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Michigan is 49.6 out of 100. Climate normals describe long-run weather; the FEMA score on PlainCities is a state average of county NRI inputs and combines hazards, exposure, vulnerability, and resilience.
FEMA risk index (state avg)
49.6
Annual precipitation
28.8 in
Mean temperature
42.2°F
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
Is Escanaba growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -154 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -1.2% change. No comparable local building-permit series is available here, so population change should not be read as a housing-supply measure. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Recent estimates point downward. A falling count can reflect migration, household size, annexation boundaries, or estimation noise, so it is a prompt to inspect the full series rather than a claim about local economic health.
2020 estimate
12,411
2025 estimate
12,257
Period change
-1.2%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Lowest-decile income · poverty 13.9% (High poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
96.2 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Michigan average
F
City profile score · Escanaba, MI
28/100
5 published dimensions · ACS/FBI 2023
Comparative score against U.S. cities with population of 1,000 or more on Census ACS medians
(income, poverty, bachelor's share, cost of living) and FBI UCR violent-crime rates when
published. Higher means a stronger standing on those published figures, not a livability
rating, not a recommendation to move, buy, or pick a "best" city. Missing inputs drop out
and redistribute weight.
How it is calculated.
Cost of living C
96.2 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Bachelor's+ share F
18.9%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate F
13.9%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime F
357 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income F
$40,169
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Escanaba profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 57/100 (C) · 96.2 index
Bachelor's+ share: 31/100 (F) · 18.9%
Poverty rate: 25/100 (F) · 13.9%
Violent crime: 25/100 (F) · 357 /100k
Household income: 7/100 (F) · $40,169
Where Escanaba sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Escanaba's median home value and FBI crime rate plotted with similar-size and
same-state peers (padded with large cities when the peer set is thin). The second
read: pricey does not always mean safer, check which quadrant this city lands in.
Census ACS median home value vs FBI UCR crime rate - Escanaba highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Escanaba, MI (this city): home $116,600, crime 2,354/100k
Palmer, MA : home $255,000, crime 949/100k
Eureka, MO : home $352,200, crime 995/100k
Riverview, MI : home $200,500, crime 1,142/100k
Melvindale, MI : home $113,100, crime 1,467/100k
New Baltimore, MI : home $309,800, crime 443/100k
Woodhaven, MI : home $221,200, crime 1,655/100k
Fenton, MI : home $211,700, crime 2,566/100k
Niles, MI : home $115,400, crime 2,352/100k
How does Escanaba compare to other US cities?
Here's how Escanaba stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income8% higher than other cities
Home value16% pricier than other cities
Median rent32% pricier than other cities
Safety25% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
A national percentile can hide a lot of local variation: narrowed to Michigan alone, Escanaba ranks #200 of 254 Michigan cities by lowest crime rate - a different, more locally useful comparison than stacking it against the entire country.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Escanaba against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Michigan only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Michigan-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Escanaba near the bottom of Michigan's cities
Among the 727 Michigan cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Escanaba ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Escanaba only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#658 of 718
8th percentile in Michigan
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 727
0th percentile in Michigan
Median Home Value
#491 of 721
32nd percentile in Michigan
Poverty Rate
#191 of 727
74th percentile in Michigan
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#373 of 727
48th percentile in Michigan
How in-state ranks are ordered
Ranked by raw value (highest first); a higher rank is not automatically "better" for every measure, see each metric's own context above. This is a comparison within Michigan only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
8th percentile nationally for median household income · 25th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Escanaba's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Escanaba's percentile rank on 3 favorable-direction measures (income, affordability, safety) vs. every tracked US city -- higher on every axis is more favorable. Not a composite quality score, just the arithmetic mean of the axes shown.
How Escanaba's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$116,600Among the most affordablemore affordable than 84% of 15,600 US cities
Show national distribution
Each bar is a $25K-wide band; taller bars hold more US cities. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year Estimates · 2023
Escanaba's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.9×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#6,150 of 15,516
More affordable than 60% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#766 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 2.9×, Escanaba sits in the affordable band:
national rank #6,150 of 15,516 and #766 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
The multiple is comparatively compact among tracked cities, but a low ratio can still coexist with slow demand or household-level hardship.
How this ratio is calculated
Ratio = Census ACS 2023 median home value ÷ median household income for cities with both fields and population ≥ 1,000.
Rank 1 = lowest ratio (most compact). Bands match the fleet affordability thresholds used on guides (<3.0 / 3.0–5.0 / >5.0).
This is not a mortgage payment estimate and does not include rates, taxes, insurance, or down payment.
Income distribution context
$40,169Escanaba, MI median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Escanaba, MI median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Escanaba, MI.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)18.9%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)13.9%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)47.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
12,374
Median Income
$40,169
Median Home Value
$116,600
Median Age
43.5
Poverty Rate
13.9%
Labor force participation
47.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
18.9%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2353.7
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
357.1
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1996.6
per 100,000 residents
Crime reporting caveat
Reflects incidents reported to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program — agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies by jurisdiction and year, so this reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score. Not adjusted for tourism, commuter, or daytime population.
Climate
Avg Temperature
42.2°F
Annual Precipitation
28.8"
Annual Snowfall
46.9"
Schools
Total Schools
1
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Escanaba's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
12,411 residents
2021
12,391 residents
2022
12,372 residents
2023
12,356 residents
2024
12,308 residents
2025
12,257 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
10.6 minutes
Drive Alone
74.7%
Carpool
13.5%
Public Transit
0.8%
Walk
3.2%
Work from Home
4.9%
Other
2.9%
Based on 4,695 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Michigan statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $238
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Michigan at $238 (electricity about $105 , water and sewer about $48 ).
These are Michigan statewide averages, not a meter reading for Escanaba. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Michigan's BEA cost-of-living index is 96.2 (Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Escanaba is $1,113/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Michigan statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 49.6 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Michigan statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Escanaba sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Escanaba compares to similar-size Michigan cities
Same-state peer method
Closest same-state population matches, not geographic neighbors. Population + median household income come from Census Bureau ACS 5-year B01001 and B19013.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year 2023, FBI UCR, NOAA Climate Normals, NCES CCD, Census ACS B08301/B08136, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023, BEA Regional Price Parities 2024, HUD Fair Market Rents 2026, FEMA National Risk Index.