Ashland is a somewhat small town located in the state of Massachusetts. With a population of 14,674 people and two constituent neighborhoods, Ashland is the 125th largest community in Massachusetts.

Ashland is a decidedly white-collar town, with fully 86.24% of the workforce employed in white-collar jobs, well above the national average. Overall, Ashland is a town of sales and office workers, professionals, and managers. There are especially a lot of people living in Ashland who work in management occupations (16.10%), office and administrative support jobs (13.86%), and sales jobs (13.16%).

Also of interest is that Ashland has more people living here who work in computers and math than 95% of the places in the US.

Ashland, while not large, also appears to be attractive to some younger, educated professionals, who help shape the character of the town.

In addition to being popular with young singles, Ashland is also home to many people who can be described as "urban sophisticates." Urban sophisticates are educated, wealthy, executives and professionals, who have urbane tastes in books, food, and travel, whether they actually live in a big city, or choose to reside in a small town. In big or medium-sized cities, urban sophisticates tend to frequent art institutions such as opera, symphonies, ballet, live theatre, and museums.

Because of many things, Ashland is a great place for families with children to consider. First of all, many other families with children live here, making Ashland a place where both parents and children are more likely to develop social ties with other families, as well as find family-oriented services and community. The town's good public school district and large population of college-educated adults provide an environment conducive to academic values. With regard to real estate, Ashland has a high rate of owner-occupied single family homes, which tends to reflect stability in the local community. Finally, Ashland's overall crime rate is lower than average for the country.

One downside of living in Ashland is that it can take a long time to commute to work. In Ashland, the average commute to work is 32.78 minutes, which is quite a bit higher than the national average.

Ashland Information and Demographics

If knowledge is power, Ashland is a pretty powerful place. 45.58% of the adults in Ashland have earned a 4-year college degree, masters degree, MD, law degree, or even PhD. Compare that to the national average of 14.96% for all cities and towns.

The per capita income in Ashland in 2000 was $31,641, which is upper middle income relative to Massachusetts, and wealthy relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $126,564 for a family of four. However, Ashland contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.

The people who call Ashland home come from a variety of different races and ancestries. The most prevalent race in Ashland is White, followed by Asian. Important ancestries of people in Ashland include Irish, Italian, English, Russian, German, French, French Canadian, and Polish.

The most common language spoken in Ashland is English.