Berkeley is a larger medium-sized coastal city (ie. on the ocean or tidally-influenced rivers) located in the state of California. With a population of 102,743 people and 32 constituent neighborhoods, Berkeley is the 54th largest community in California. Much of the housing stock in Berkeley was built prior to World War II, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.

Berkeley is a decidedly white-collar city, with fully 91.30% of the workforce employed in white-collar jobs, well above the national average. Overall, Berkeley is a city of professionals, sales and office workers, and managers. There are especially a lot of people living in Berkeley who work in teaching (12.97%), office and administrative support jobs (12.75%), and management occupations (10.88%).

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

And if you like science, one thing you'll find is that Berkeley has lots of scientists living in town - whether they be life scientists, physical scientists (like astronomers), or social scientists (like geographers!). So, if you're scientific-minded, you might like it here too.

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

Berkeley is made interesting by being both a reasonably big city and having a major college student population: students here will find that the city provides a lot of amenities, culture, and opportunities for them. Berkeley is more than just a college town, however, though the thousands of students certainly are a major part of the character of the city, as well as a contributor to the local economy.

Not only is Berkeley a city with many college students, but it also retains many recent graduates who are looking to start new careers, creating a decent-sized population of people who are young, single, educated, and upwardly-mobile. This makes it a good choice for other relocating single professionals. Here, these young singles will find many others like themselves, with opportunities for friendships, socializing, romance, and fun.

In addition to being popular with young singles, Berkeley 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.

One of the nice things about Berkeley is that is it nautical, meaning that parts of the city are somewhat historic and on the ocean, or touch tidal bodies of water, such as inlets and tidal rivers. Because of this, visitors and locals will often go to these areas to take in the scenery or to enjoy waterfront activities.

Berkeley Information and Demographics

If knowledge is power, Berkeley is a pretty powerful place. 64.25% of the adults in Berkeley 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 Berkeley in 2000 was $30,477, which is upper middle income relative to California, and wealthy relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $121,908 for a family of four.

Berkeley is an extremely ethnically-diverse city. The people who call Berkeley home come from a variety of different races and ancestries. The most prevalent race in Berkeley is White, followed by Asian. Important ancestries of people in Berkeley include German, English, Irish, Italian, Russian, and European.

Foreign born people are also an important part of Berkeley's cultural character, accounting for 20.36% of the city's population.

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