Wellesley is a medium-sized town located in the state of Massachusetts. With a population of 26,613 people and five constituent neighborhoods, Wellesley is the 67th largest community in Massachusetts.

Wellesley is a decidedly white-collar town, with fully 96.41% of the workforce employed in white-collar jobs, well above the national average. Overall, Wellesley is a town of professionals, managers, and sales and office workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Wellesley who work in management occupations (19.65%), sales jobs (11.56%), and office and administrative support jobs (11.17%).

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

Of important note, Wellesley is also a town of artists. Wellesley has more artists, designers and people working in media than 90% of the communities in America. This concentration of artists helps shape Wellesley's character.

One interesting thing about the economy is that relatively large numbers of people worked from their homes - 7.89% of the workforce. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce this is high compared to the rest of the county. 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.

Wellesley is also a college town, where lots of students live while attending area colleges. Because of the high percentage of people living in Wellesley enrolled in college, Wellesley has a number of services, amenities and opportunities geared towards the needs and activities of students.

Wellesley, 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, Wellesley is also home to many people who can be described as "urban sophisticates," which are people who are not only wealthy and employed in professional occupations, but highly educated to boot. Urban sophisticates have urbane tastes - whether they reside in a big or small city, a suburb, or a little town. Urban sophisticates support bookstores, quality clothing stores, enjoy luxury travel, and in big cities, they are truly the patrons of the arts, attending and supporting institutions such as opera, symphony, ballet, and theatre.

Because of many things, Wellesley is a very good place for families to consider. With an enviable combination of good schools, low crime, college-educated neighbors who tend to support education because of their own experiences, and a high rate of home ownership in predominantly single-family properties, Wellesley really has some of the features that families look for when choosing a good community to raise children. Is Wellesley perfect? Of course not, and if you like frenetic night life, it will be far from your cup of tea. But overall this is a solid community, with many things to recommend it as a family-friendly place to live.

Wellesley Information and Demographics

Do you like to read, write and learn? If you move to Wellesley, you'll likely find that many of your neighbors like to as well. Wellesley is one of the more educated communities in America, with a full 75.89% of its adults having a college degree or even advanced degree, compared to a national average across all communities of 14.96%.

The per capita income in Wellesley in 2000 was $52,866, which is wealthy relative to Massachusetts and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $211,464 for a family of four. However, Wellesley contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.

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

The most common language spoken in Wellesley is English. Other important languages spoken here include Chinese and Spanish.