Who lives in Scranton, Pennsylvania

Scranton is a city of about 76,119 in the Lackawanna Valley, the seat of Pennsylvania's old anthracite coal country and the place that wired up some of the country's first electric streetcars. The mines and rail yards that built it are long gone, and the work now centers on hospitals, the University of Scranton, and the retail and service jobs that fill in around them. The age curve sits close to the national shape, a touch younger at the bottom where the college bands push the 18-to-24 share to roughly 17% against about 13% nationally, and steady through the older years.

The loudest thing about these households is financial. About 56% are non-investors, half again the national share, and roughly 43% save nothing in a typical month. Faith is the other defining mark: around 54% identify as Catholic, close to double the national rate, the residue of Irish, Italian, and Polish parishes that organized whole neighborhoods around the church when the mines were running.

On personality these residents read close to the national middle. Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, and agreeableness all land within a point or two of baseline, so there is no exotic temperament to design around. The one small lift is on the worry-and-strain side, a few points above average, which tracks with a place that has absorbed decades of economic contraction and learned to keep a wary eye on the next bill.

Decision speed and risk appetite both run near the national pattern, with risk leaning slightly cautious at the top end. The thin slice of true risk-takers is about half the usual size, which fits a household economy with little cushion to absorb a bad bet.

Values here sit close to the national center. Preference for local business, ethical-consumption habits, and environmental concern all land within a few points of average, so neither a strong buy-local identity nor a green-conscience identity is doing much work. There is a faint lean toward corporate wariness, with the most cynical-of-big-business slice running a little above average, which reads naturally in a Rust Belt town that watched its anchor industries pull out.

The practical read is that appeals built on civic virtue or sustainability will not carry much weight on their own. Price, reliability, and a sense that a business is straight with people matter more than mission language.

Reach here is ordinary and that is the useful finding. Platform use mirrors the national mix, with Facebook the workhorse at about a third of residents and the rest spread across Instagram, YouTube, and a thinner TikTok and X presence. Content appetite splits evenly between short video, longer video, and mixed formats with no strong tilt.

Facebook is the dependable backbone for a Catholic, multi-generational, locally rooted audience. Lean on it for community reach and treat the other channels as supporting rather than central.

This is a paycheck-to-paycheck spending culture. Beyond the roughly 43% who save nothing and the 56% who don't invest, weekly shopping is rare, with only about 8% buying on a weekly cadence against nearly 20% nationally, so purchasing clusters into occasional, planned trips. Excellent credit is about half as common as nationally, near 13%, and frequent returners are well below average, the mark of careful, deliberate buys rather than easy churn.

Price leads motivation, edging out quality. These are households that decide slowly, buy occasionally, and expect the purchase to hold up, because there is little margin to replace it.

Health posture skews toward awareness without much intensity. The share that treats wellness as a central project is small, roughly 4% in the most devoted bracket against about 9% nationally, and more residents land in the indifferent column. Sleep is the sharper signal: only about a fifth make it a real priority, well below the national third, which fits shift work, service hours, and tight household budgets.

Openness about mental health runs a little below average at the most vocal end, with more people keeping it private. In a city this Catholic and this multi-generational, struggles tend to stay inside the family and the parish rather than the open feed.