City safety & data profile
ShafterCA
Shafter, CA is a 18K-resident city in Kern County with a median household income of $71,215.
Kern County, California. Federal health, economic, and safety indicators for Shafter, drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, CDC PLACES, and CMS Hospital Compare. Shafter has a population larger than 39% of the 4,640 U.S. cities Areazine tracks, and a median home value of $335,800.
Data updated 2026-09-04
- 18K
- Population (place)
- Bottom 40%
- By size
- $71,215
- Median income (place)
- $335,800
- Median home (place)
- 20.7%
- Poverty rate (place)
The read on Shafter
Shafter posts a median household income higher than 38% of U.S. cities Areazine tracks.
- Bottom 39%
- by median income, US cities
Where Shafter income ranks nationally
Median household income vs. every place Areazine profiles (place-level ACS)
$71,215 Bottom 38% higher than 38% of 3,889 places Areazine profiles
Each bar is a $20K-wide band; taller bars hold more places Areazine profiles. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (place-level) · 2024 ACS 5-year
Largest cities in CA
Population among 482 CA places with 10,000+ residents and ACS income on Areazine. Tooltip shows the income rank in the same pool.
- Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA
3,820,914 residents
- San Diego 1,404,452
San Diego, CA
1,404,452 residents
- San Jose 997,368
San Jose, CA
997,368 residents
- San Francisco 827,526
San Francisco, CA
827,526 residents
- Fresno 542,107
Fresno, CA
542,107 residents
- Sacramento 524,943
Sacramento, CA
524,943 residents
- Long Beach 474,140
Long Beach, CA
474,140 residents
- Oakland 419,267
Oakland, CA
419,267 residents
- Bakersfield 373,640
Bakersfield, CA
373,640 residents
- Anaheim 350,742
Anaheim, CA
350,742 residents
What this shows Los Angeles is the largest CA city on this list; Alamo leads median income.
Highest median incomes in CA
Median household income among the same 482-city pool. Tooltip shows the population rank.
- Alamo
Alamo, CA
$250,001 median
- Hillsborough
Hillsborough, CA
$250,001 median
- Los Altos
Los Altos, CA
$250,001 median
- Orinda
Orinda, CA
$250,001 median
- Piedmont
Piedmont, CA
$250,001 median
- Saratoga
Saratoga, CA
$250,001 median
- Coto De Caza
Coto De Caza, CA
$243,816 median
- Tamalpais-Ho…
Tamalpais-Homestead Valley, CA
$243,227 median
- Palos Verdes…
Palos Verdes Estates, CA
$242,014 median
- San Carlos
San Carlos, CA
$237,470 median
What this shows Alamo posts the highest place-level median income in CA; Los Angeles is largest by headcount.
The quick read
Reading Shafter, CA beyond the headline numbers
Shafter sits inside Kern County, California, at roughly 35.50°N, -119.27°W. Population 18,336, $71,215 median household income. Median home value $335,800, median rent $1,253. Poverty rate 20.7%, read against that income figure since two cities on the same median can differ underneath it.
20.7% of Shafter, CA residents live below the poverty line, placing it in the hardest-hit quarter of reporting cities. Read every median on this page against that: half the households are above it, and a large minority are far below.
A median home in Shafter runs about 4.7 times median household income, above the midpoint. Multiples in this range usually mean buyers are arriving from outside the local wage base.
Only 4.4% of Shafter workers report working from home, the lowest quarter of reporting cities -- an economy still built around showing up somewhere.
Among the CDC measures on this page, lack of health insurance departs furthest from its peer median: 23.4% in Shafter, the highest-prevalence quarter of the 3,759 cities reporting that measure.
Shafter's median age is 28.1 years, in the youngest quarter of reporting cities.
Sources: U.S. Census ACS, CDC PLACES, CMS Hospital Compare, plus live alerts for Shafter from FEMA, NOAA, FDA, and CPSC. Economic comparison bars use the unweighted average across tracked Census places with a reported value, not a household-weighted national median.
10-Year Trends 2013–2024
County-level trend (Kern County): Shafter's own historical series isn't separately published by the Census Bureau, so these year-over-year figures track the surrounding county, not the city alone.
Economics
| Indicator | Value |
|---|---|
| Median Rent | |
| Poverty Rate | 20.7% +67% vs avg |
| Unemployment | 5.8% |
| Bachelor's Degree+ | 12.2% |
| Work From Home | 4.4% |
| Public Transit | 0.5% |
Population
Health Profile 15 measures
Health Indicators
Preventive Care
Other Measures
What alerts and safety updates affect Shafter?
No area-tagged alerts are on record for Shafter right now. New federal and counterpart-agency notices still land in the site feed as agencies publish them.
City alert dispatch desk
Sheet CA-SHAFTER · Shafter
Shafter: no area-tagged alerts on record — state hubs carry the live CAP stream.
- FEED-QUIET No tagged alerts
- LEAD-NONE Feed idle
- DESK-IDLE Awaiting feed
Counts reflect published articles tagged to Shafter; untagged NOAA county warnings may still appear in the site feed. Browse California state hubs · Methodology
Read with this city profile
Frequently Asked Questions 5
What is the population of Shafter, CA? ▼
What is the median household income in Shafter? ▼
What is the median home value in Shafter? ▼
What are the top health concerns in Shafter? ▼
What is the median age in Shafter? ▼
Nationwide cities with similar poverty or income 8
Two ACS-derived peer sets for Shafter, both outside California so the neighborhoods are not the geographic nearby list below.
Similar poverty rate
Nearest place-level ACS poverty rates outside CA (20.7% here).
Similar median income
Nearest place-level ACS median household incomes outside CA ($71,215 here).
Compare Shafter with another city
Pick a second U.S. city to open a side-by-side profile on population, income, health, and hospitals, the same federal datasets as this page.
Nearby Cities 8
Using Shafter's profile
Use this as a starting research checklist, not a verdict on whether to live here.
- Check live recalls, weather and hazard alerts scoped to the Shafter area before relying on national headlines. Check your area
- Read the poverty rate alongside the income figure, two places with the same median can have very different realities.
- Compare Shafter against California peers on any ranking lens. Explore California
Population and economics (income, home value, poverty, education) are place-level U.S. Census ACS; health is CDC PLACES; hospital counts reflect facilities in and around the city. County-level trends are labeled when shown.
Data Sources
All data on this page comes from official U.S. government sources. Population and economic data from the Census Bureau American Community Survey (2024 5-year estimates, place geography). Health data from the CDC PLACES program (2023). Hospital ratings from CMS Hospital Compare (2024). Climate data from NOAA. Education data from NCES. Cost of living from Bureau of Economic Analysis. Crime statistics, where referenced on Areazine, originate from the FBI Crime Data Explorer. Housing market figures referenced on Areazine come from HUD Fair Market Rents. Census economics and population are at place geography; some health and hospital indicators are reported at the county level (Kern County) where that is the smallest published unit.
Every figure on Areazine is published directly from official U.S. government sources, no number is typed in by an editor. City demographic and health figures are compiled directly from U.S. Census (place-level ACS), CDC, and CMS releases, updated quarterly within 30 days of upstream release. County-level trends are labeled when shown. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026.