Burlington is a medium-sized city located in the state of Vermont. With a population of 38,889 people and 11 constituent neighborhoods, Burlington is the second largest community in Vermont. Much of the housing stock in Burlington was built prior to World War II, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.

Unlike some cities where white-collar or blue-collar occupations dominate the local economy, Burlington is neither predominently one or the other. Instead, it has a mixed workforce of both white- and blue-collar jobs. Overall, Burlington is a city of sales and office workers, professionals, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in Burlington who work in office and administrative support jobs (16.67%), sales jobs (11.92%), and management occupations (7.80%).

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

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

Burlington is also a major college town with a large number of people who are 18 years or older and attending college. As is often the case in college towns, the many students that live in Burlington have a strong influence on the local culture and entertainment scene, which may seem dormant by comparison in the summer months when much of the student population is away. In the fall, the return of students has a reinvigorating effect on the community. Because colleges are lasting institutions, they have a stabilizing effect on the economy by providing direct local benefits such as jobs for faculty and staff and spending by students. Burlington's economy is one such example of this.

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

Residents of the city have the good fortune of having one of the shortest daily commutes compared to the rest of the country. On average, they spend only 16.82 minutes getting to work every day.

Although the majority of commuting trips in the city are by private automobile, Burlington is somewhat unusual for a city of its size for having a substantial number of people who use public transportation. The bus helps to get a lot of people to and from their jobs every morning, which benefits everyone in the Burlington area by reducing both traffic and air pollution.

Burlington Information and Demographics

The education level of Burlington citizens is very high relative to the national average among all cities (14.96%): 42.04% of adults in Burlington have a bachelor's degree or even advanced degree.

The per capita income in Burlington in 2000 was $19,011, which is middle income relative to Vermont, and upper middle income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $76,044 for a family of four.

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

The most common language spoken in Burlington is English. Other important languages spoken here include French and Serbo-Croatian.