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Place dossier plate
SheetPA-BROWNSVILLE-PA · Brownsville, PA 2,539 pop · income 2nd pct
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 Brownsville
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Brownsville on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Boone · lowest
28,633
Boone · lowest
28,633 median HH income
26.9% of the leader · rank #1
Hayden · near
28,654
Hayden · near
28,654 median HH income
27.0% of the leader · rank #2
Brownsville · this city
28,656
Brownsville · this city
28,656 median HH income
27.0% of the leader · rank #3
Yanceyville · near
28,662
Yanceyville · near
28,662 median HH income
27.0% of the leader · rank #4
Villanueva · near
28,665
Villanueva · near
28,665 median HH income
27.0% of the leader · rank #5
Pembine · near
28,672
Pembine · near
28,672 median HH income
27.0% of the leader · rank #6
Pine Canyon · highest
106,284
Pine Canyon · highest
106,284 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #7
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 Brownsville 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: 2,539.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Brownsville - the verdict
Brownsville ranks in the 2nd percentile for household income and the 45th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
2nd
percentile, household income
1st
percentile, home value
54th
percentile, median rent
45th
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: Brownsville, PA
Brownsville is a small town in Pennsylvania, home to 2,539 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. The typical household in Brownsville brings in $28,656 a year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 30.3%. Home values in Brownsville run a median of $63,900, and the median resident age is 46.1 years. Educational attainment runs 11.1% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 44.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Brownsville reports a comparatively low crime rate: per-100,000 total crime stands at 1540.7 in FBI UCR data, below the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Pennsylvania tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Pennsylvania at 97.6 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Near Average). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $1,225 per month. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts Pennsylvania's average monthly utility costs around $260 (state average). On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 67.4 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Brownsville'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 reported crime to housing and income to work and mobility to schools and households to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Brownsville, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, annual population history, matched public-school count, FBI reported-crime rates.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles, 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 Brownsville?
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 Pennsylvania, the closest population matches are Millersburg (2,538 residents, $65,190 income); New Stanton (2,538 residents, $74,265 income); Curwensville (2,544 residents, $50,679 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Pine Canyon, CA (2,538 residents); Kent Acres, DE (2,540 residents); Sandstone, MN (2,538 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 can the FBI record say about safety in Brownsville?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 1540.7 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 32% lower 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.
How far does income reach against housing in Brownsville?
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. The ratio makes housing the clearest place to start this profile, but a low multiple can coexist with slow demand, older stock, or household-level hardship. Compare the home-value distribution and same-state peer table before treating it as an advantage.
The home-value-to-income reference is relatively compact: the ACS median home value is 2.2 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 30.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
What does the journey to work look like in Brownsville?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 70.8%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
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.
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 Brownsville?
The city has a broader matched school footprint, but count alone does not describe performance, capacity, program availability, or attendance boundaries. This profile deliberately avoids converting it into an unsupported family-friendliness score.
The NCES join finds 3 public schools within the city match. 11.1% 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
30.3%
Bachelor's degree+
11.1%
Matched public schools
3
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
Is Brownsville growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -100 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -4.6% 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
2,175
2025 estimate
2,075
Period change
-4.6%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Lowest-decile income · poverty 30.3% (Highest-decile poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
97.6 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Pennsylvania average
F
City profile score · Brownsville, PA
18/100
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-
97.6 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Violent crime F
289 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share F
11.1%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$28,656
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
30.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Brownsville profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 50/100 (C-) · 97.6 index
Violent crime: 35/100 (F) · 289 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 9/100 (F) · 11.1%
Household income: 0/100 (F) · $28,656
Poverty rate: 0/100 (F) · 30.3%
Where Brownsville sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Brownsville'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 - Brownsville highlighted among 25 peers.Read the chart values
Brownsville, PA (this city): home $63,900, crime 1,541/100k
Winfield, WV : home $226,000, crime 339/100k
Millersburg, PA : home $123,500, crime 557/100k
Curwensville, PA : home $95,700, crime 403/100k
Dupont, PA : home $142,100, crime 975/100k
New York, NY : home $751,700, crime 3,039/100k
Los Angeles, CA : home $879,500, crime 2,212/100k
Chicago, IL : home $315,200, crime 4,012/100k
Houston, TX : home $253,400, crime 5,442/100k
Phoenix, AZ : home $381,900, crime 3,125/100k
Philadelphia, PA : home $232,400, crime 5,457/100k
San Antonio, TX : home $219,700, crime 5,218/100k
San Diego, CA : home $848,500, crime 2,082/100k
Dallas, TX : home $295,300, crime 4,010/100k
San Jose, CA : home $1,187,800, crime 3,195/100k
Austin, TX : home $512,700, crime 3,709/100k
Fort Worth, TX : home $277,300, crime 3,158/100k
Columbus, OH : home $234,500, crime 3,088/100k
Indianapolis, IN : home $207,000, crime 4,214/100k
San Francisco, CA : home $1,380,500, crime 4,526/100k
Seattle, WA : home $912,100, crime 5,783/100k
Denver, CO : home $586,700, crime 5,755/100k
Oklahoma City, OK : home $215,100, crime 3,570/100k
El Paso, TX : home $171,700, crime 1,772/100k
Washington, DC : home $724,600, crime 4,514/100k
How does Brownsville compare to other US cities?
Here's how Brownsville stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income2% higher than other cities
Home value1% pricier than other cities
Median rent54% pricier than other cities
Safety45% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Pennsylvania and the picture shifts: Brownsville ranks #309 of 402 Pennsylvania cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Brownsville against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Pennsylvania only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Pennsylvania-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Brownsville near the bottom of Pennsylvania's cities
Among the 1,865 Pennsylvania cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Brownsville ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Brownsville only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,755 of 1,765
1st percentile in Pennsylvania
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,865
0th percentile in Pennsylvania
Median Home Value
#1,732 of 1,790
3rd percentile in Pennsylvania
Poverty Rate
#60 of 1,856
97th percentile in Pennsylvania
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#1,588 of 1,861
14th percentile in Pennsylvania
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 Pennsylvania only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
2nd percentile nationally for median household income · 45th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Brownsville's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Brownsville'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 Brownsville's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$63,900Among the most affordablemore affordable than 99% 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
Brownsville's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.2×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#2,606 of 15,516
More affordable than 83% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,431 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 2.2×, Brownsville sits in the affordable band:
national rank #2,606 of 15,516 and #2,431 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
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
$28,656Brownsville, PA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Brownsville, PA median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Brownsville, PA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)11.1%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)30.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)44.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
2,539
Median Income
$28,656
Median Home Value
$63,900
Median Age
46.1
Poverty Rate
30.3%
Labor force participation
44.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
11.1%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1540.7
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
288.9
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1251.8
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.
Schools
Total Schools
3
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Brownsville's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
2,175 residents
2021
2,151 residents
2022
2,123 residents
2023
2,106 residents
2024
2,094 residents
2025
2,075 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
70.8%
Carpool
18.7%
Public Transit
3.1%
Walk
2.1%
Work from Home
5.3%
Based on 889 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Pennsylvania statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $260
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Pennsylvania at $260 (electricity about $120 , water and sewer about $52 ).
These are Pennsylvania statewide averages, not a meter reading for Brownsville. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Pennsylvania's BEA cost-of-living index is 97.6 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Brownsville is $1,225/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Pennsylvania statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 67.4 / 100 (Moderate).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Pennsylvania statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Brownsville sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Brownsville compares to similar-size Pennsylvania 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, 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.