About Chelan

Chelan is a very small city located in the state of Washington. With a population of 3,594 people and just one neighborhood, Chelan is the 157th largest community in Washington.

Unlike some cities where white-collar or blue-collar occupations dominate the local economy, Chelan is neither predominently one or the other. Instead, it has a mixed workforce of both white- and blue-collar jobs. Overall, Chelan is a city of service providers, sales and office workers, and professionals. There are especially a lot of people living in Chelan who work in sales jobs (11.79%), office and administrative support jobs (10.56%), and food service (9.54%).

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

Telecommuters are a relatively large percentage of the workforce: 10.23% 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.

One of the benefits of Chelan is that there is very little traffic. The average commute to work is 17.60 minutes, which is substantially less than the national average. Not only does this mean that the drive to work is less aggravating, but noise and pollution levels are lower as a result.

Being a small city, Chelan does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.

Chelan Information and Demographics

In terms of college education, Chelan is somewhat better educated than the 14.96% who have a 4-year degree or higher in the typical US community: 20.54% of adults 25 and older in the city have at least a bachelor's degree.

The per capita income in Chelan in 2000 was $16,511, which is lower middle income relative to Washington and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $66,044 for a family of four.

Chelan is a somewhat ethnically-diverse city. The people who call Chelan home come from a variety of different races and ancestries. The most prevalent race in Chelan is White, followed by Native American. Chelan also has a sizeable Hispanic population (people of Hispanic origin can be of any race). People of Hispanic or Latino origin account for 16.05% of the city's residents. Important ancestries of people in Chelan include German, English, Irish, Norwegian, Scottish, and Scotch-Irish.

The most common language spoken in Chelan is English. Some people also speak Spanish.