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Place dossier plate
SheetPA-SHIPPENSBURG-PA · Shippensburg, PA 5,811 pop · income 23rd 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 Shippensburg
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Shippensburg on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
McKees Rocks · lowest
33,510
McKees Rocks · lowest
33,510 median HH income
13.4% of the leader · rank #1
Liberty · near
52,341
Liberty · near
52,341 median HH income
20.9% of the leader · rank #2
Shippensburg · this city
52,344
Shippensburg · this city
52,344 median HH income
20.9% of the leader · rank #3
Huntington · near
52,344
Huntington · near
52,344 median HH income
20.9% of the leader · rank #4
Charlevoix · near
52,344
Charlevoix · near
52,344 median HH income
20.9% of the leader · rank #5
Warden · near
52,344
Warden · near
52,344 median HH income
20.9% of the leader · rank #6
Merion Station · highest
250,001
Merion Station · highest
250,001 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 Shippensburg 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: 5,811.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Shippensburg - the verdict
Nationally, Shippensburg sits in the 23rd percentile for household income and the 58th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
23rd
percentile, household income
31st
percentile, home value
54th
percentile, median rent
58th
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: Shippensburg, PA
5,811 people live in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Shippensburg households earn a median of $52,344 annually, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 5.8%. Shippensburg's housing stock carries a median value of $163,200, and the median resident age is 34.6 years. About 33.1% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 58.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 5 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Low Activity). Shippensburg reports a comparatively low crime rate: FBI UCR figures show 1154.3 crimes per 100,000 residents, below the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score). NOAA climate normals record an annual average temperature of 53.2°F with 42.5 inches of precipitation per year and 33.6 inches of snowfall.
Pennsylvania tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: the state registers 97.6 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Near Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,225 per month statewide. 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 Shippensburg'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 population change to housing and income to comparison shortlist to reported crime to schools and households to work and mobility to climate and hazard context; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Shippensburg, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Population change
Is Shippensburg growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Recent estimates point upward. Growth can increase housing demand and service needs, but the permit record must move in the same direction before calling it a supply response; the two series measure different things.
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +136 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +2.5% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 5 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
How far does income reach against housing in Shippensburg?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.1 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 5.8%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Shippensburg?
Within Pennsylvania, the closest population matches are Merion Station (5,796 residents, $250,000+ income); McKees Rocks (5,827 residents, $33,510 income); Sierra View (5,795 residents, $85,250 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Gardnerville, NV (5,811 residents); Slaton, TX (5,811 residents); Ulysses, KS (5,812 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.
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.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Shippensburg?
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.
The joined FBI UCR record reports 1154.3 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 49% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
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 Shippensburg?
The NCES join finds 6 public schools within the city match. 33.1% 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.
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.
Matched public schools
6
Bachelor's degree+
33.1%
Poverty estimate
5.8%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Shippensburg?
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.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 66.7%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Public transit
0.1%
Work from home
7.7%
Drive alone
66.7%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 2,792 workers age 16+.
What physical conditions frame life in Shippensburg?
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 53.2°F, with 42.5 inches of precipitation and 33.6 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Pennsylvania is 67.4 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.
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.
Mean temperature
53.2°F
Annual precipitation
42.5 in
FEMA risk index (state avg)
67.4
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Pennsylvania average
C-
City profile score · Shippensburg, PA
51/100
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.
Violent crime B-
107 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share C+
33.1%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate C+
5.8%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
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.
Household income F
$52,344
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Shippensburg profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Violent crime: 69/100 (B-) · 107 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 63/100 (C+) · 33.1%
Poverty rate: 60/100 (C+) · 5.8%
Cost of living: 50/100 (C-) · 97.6 index
Household income: 23/100 (F) · $52,344
Where Shippensburg sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Shippensburg'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 - Shippensburg highlighted among 27 peers.Read the chart values
Shippensburg, PA (this city): home $163,200, crime 1,154/100k
Slaton, TX : home $86,400, crime 1,673/100k
Ulysses, KS : home $123,100, crime 144/100k
Peculiar, MO : home $252,400, crime 1,120/100k
Windcrest, TX : home $276,900, crime 11,515/100k
Oxford, PA : home $309,600, crime 1,003/100k
Plymouth, PA : home $85,400, crime 2,745/100k
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 Shippensburg compare to other US cities?
Here's how Shippensburg stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income23% higher than other cities
Home value31% pricier than other cities
Median rent54% pricier than other cities
Safety58% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
National percentiles can mask local variation. Looking only at Pennsylvania, Shippensburg ranks #255 of 402 Pennsylvania cities by lowest crime rate - a narrower, more locally useful cut than the national comparison above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Shippensburg 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 Shippensburg near the bottom of Pennsylvania's cities
Among the 1,865 Pennsylvania cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Shippensburg ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Shippensburg only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,391 of 1,765
21st percentile in Pennsylvania
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,865
0th percentile in Pennsylvania
Median Home Value
#937 of 1,790
47th percentile in Pennsylvania
Poverty Rate
#913 of 1,856
50th percentile in Pennsylvania
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#452 of 1,861
76th 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
23rd percentile nationally for median household income · 58th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Shippensburg's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Shippensburg'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 Shippensburg's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$163,200Among the most affordablemore affordable than 69% 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
Shippensburg's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.1×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#7,273 of 15,516
More affordable than 53% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#6,055 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 3.1×, Shippensburg sits in the moderate band:
national rank #7,273 of 15,516 and #6,055 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
Income and home value move in the same broad scale; check same-state peers before treating the multiple as an advantage or a warning.
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
$52,344Shippensburg, PA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Shippensburg, 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 Shippensburg, PA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)33.1%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)5.8%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)58.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
5,811
Median Income
$52,344
Median Home Value
$163,200
Median Age
34.6
Poverty Rate
5.8%
Labor force participation
58.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
33.1%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1154.3
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
106.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1047.8
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.
Climate
Avg Temperature
53.2°F
Annual Precipitation
42.5"
Annual Snowfall
33.6"
Schools
Total Schools
6
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Shippensburg's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
5,479 residents
2021
5,509 residents
2022
5,519 residents
2023
5,595 residents
2024
5,613 residents
2025
5,615 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
🏗️ Low Activity
Total Permits (2024)
5
housing units authorized
Single-Family
5
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.9
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
0
0
0
-
2020
5
2
3
$0.7M
2021
2
2
0
$0.5M
2022
45
5
40
$13.0M
2023
4
4
0
$1.1M
2024
5
5
0
$1.3M
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
66.7%
Carpool
14.5%
Public Transit
0.1%
Walk
9.8%
Work from Home
7.7%
Other
1.2%
Based on 2,792 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 Shippensburg. 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 Shippensburg 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 Shippensburg sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Shippensburg 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, NOAA Climate Normals, NCES CCD, Census BPS 2024, 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.