Plains is a very small town located in the state of Montana. With a population of 1,200 people and just one neighborhood, Plains is the 83rd largest community in Montana.
Unlike some towns where white-collar or blue-collar occupations dominate the local economy, Plains is neither predominantly one nor the other. Instead, it has a mixed workforce of both white- and blue-collar jobs. Overall, Plains is a town of sales and office workers, service providers, and professionals. There are especially a lot of people living in Plains who work in sales jobs (20.71%), management occupations (12.03%), and law enforcement and fire fighting (10.65%).
Telecommuters are a relatively large percentage of the workforce: 19.72% of people work from home. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce it is high relative to the nation. These workers are often telecommuters who work in knowledge-based, white-collar professions. For example, Silicon Valley has large numbers of people who telecommute. Other at-home workers may be self-employed people who operate small businesses out of their homes.
Overall, Plains’s crime rate is one of the lowest in the nation, which makes a great place to live if safety is an important concern.
Compared to the rest of the country, citizens of Plains spend much less time in their cars: on average, their commute to work is only 17.00 minutes. This also means that noise and pollution levels in the town are less than they would otherwise be.
Plains is a small town, and as such doesn't have a public transit system that people use to get to and from their jobs every day.
In terms of college education, the citizens of Plains rank slightly lower than the national average. 16.31% of adults 25 and older in Plains have a bachelor's degree or advanced degree, while 21.84% of adults have a 4-year degree or higher in the average American community.
The per capita income in Plains in 2022 was $28,828, which is lower middle income relative to Montana and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $115,312 for a family of four. However, Plains contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
The people who call Plains home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Plains residents report their race to be White, followed by Native American. Important ancestries of people in Plains include German, Norwegian, Irish, Swedish, and English.
The most common language spoken in Plains is English. Other important languages spoken here include Italian and Spanish.
The way a neighborhood looks and feels when you walk or drive around it, from its setting, its buildings, and its flavor, can make all the difference. This neighborhood has some really cool things about the way it looks and feels as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research. This might include anything from the housing stock to the types of households living here to how people get around.
This neighborhood has wide open spaces, few people, and lots of space to stretch out. If you like locations that fit that description, you may like this neighborhood. Based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis, with only 4 people per square mile living here, this neighborhood is less crowded than 98.4% of America. One of the notable things about is that it is one of the quietest neighborhoods in America, according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis and quantitative rating of quietness. When you are here, you will find it to be very quiet. If quiet and peaceful are your cup of tea, you may have found a great place for you.
If your dream is to be able to ride your bike to work each day, look no further than this unique neighborhood. With 3.2% of residents in the neighborhood commuting on a bicycle to and from work daily, this neighborhood has more bicycle commuters than 96.2% of all neighborhoods in the U.S., according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis.
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Scots-Irish and Swedish ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 4.1% of this neighborhood's residents have Scots-Irish ancestry and 5.7% have Swedish ancestry.
How wealthy a neighborhood is, from very wealthy, to middle income, to low income is very formative with regard to the personality and character of a neighborhood. Equally important is the rate of people, particularly children, who live below the federal poverty line. In some wealthy gated communities, the areas immediately surrounding can have high rates of childhood poverty, which indicates other social issues. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals both aspects of income and poverty for this neighborhood.
The neighbors in the neighborhood in Plains are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 86.7% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 18.6% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 66.5% of U.S. neighborhoods.
The old saying "you are what you eat" is true. But it is also true that you are what you do for a living. The types of occupations your neighbors have shape their character, and together as a group, their collective occupations shape the culture of a place.
In the neighborhood, 30.8% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is executive, management, and professional occupations, with 28.7% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (27.0%), and 11.9% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 96.8% of households. Some people also speak Italian (4.8%).
Culture is shared learned behavior. We learn it from our parents, their parents, our houses of worship, and much of our culture – our learned behavior – comes from our ancestors. That is why ancestry and ethnicity can be so interesting and important to understand: places with concentrations of people of one or more ancestries often express those shared learned behaviors and this gives each neighborhood its own culture. Even different neighborhoods in the same city can have drastically different cultures.
In the neighborhood in Plains, MT, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (22.2%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (13.0%), and residents who report English roots (10.7%), and some of the residents are also of Norwegian ancestry (6.7%), along with some Swedish ancestry residents (5.7%), among others.
Even if your neighborhood is walkable, you may still have to drive to your place of work. Some neighborhoods are located where many can get to work in just a few minutes, while others are located such that most residents have a long and arduous commute. The greatest number of commuters in neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (54.0% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (63.9%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors to get to work (10.7%) and 5.1% of residents also hop out the door and walk to work for their daily commute. In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.