In addition, Normal is a major college town that has a very high percentage of its residents over 18 years old who are college students. Naturally, collegiate life has a major influence on local Normal culture, lifestyle and entertainment options. Normal really pulses to the beat of the academic calendar. In Normal every fall, returning students reinvigorate the community, who you will notice are all over town, buying groceries, out with friends, and getting acquainted or re-acquainted with each other and Normal. One of the beneficial effects that colleges provide is that they tend to be lasting institutions that deliver direct economic benefits to the local economy in the form of such things as jobs for faculty and staff, and spending by students. Normal benefits directly from this.
Not only is Normal a town with many college students, but it also retains many recent graduates who are looking to start new careers, creating a very large population of people who are young, single, educated, and upwardly-mobile. That’s because Normal is full of single people in their 20s and 30s and who have undergraduate or graduate degrees and are starting careers in professional occupations. This makes Normal a pretty good place for young, educated career starters looking to find many people like themselves, with good opportunities for friendships, socializing, romance, and fun.
One of the benefits of Normal is that there is very little traffic. The average commute to work is 17.80 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.
If knowledge is power, Normal is a pretty powerful place. 53.88% of the adults in Normal have earned a 4-year college degree, masters degree, MD, law degree, or even PhD. Compare that to the national average of 21.84% for all cities and towns.
The per capita income in Normal in 2018 was $34,466, which is middle income relative to Illinois and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $137,864 for a family of four. However, Normal contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
Normal is a very ethnically-diverse town. The people who call Normal home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Normal residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Important ancestries of people in Normal include German, Irish, English, Polish, and Italian.
The most common language spoken in Normal is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and French.
