Chugach Census Area, Alaska

• Income premium: Households earn well above the national median, supporting strong retail and housing markets.
• Below the state median: Median household income runs $2,279 (2.5%) under the Alaska median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.

• Largest private-sector industry: Transportation and Warehousing employs 524 workers (23.2% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $132,870. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 932 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.5B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Transportation and Warehousing averages $132,870 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $31,575, a 4.2x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Water Transportation concentrates at 115.24x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 9 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 41.1% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. Demand reaches this base from more than one market rather than from a single one.

• In line with national: Home value to income ratio of 3.8x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• Elevated vacancy: 27.1% of housing units are vacant, above the Alaska rate of 17.6%.
• Mostly second homes: seasonal, recreational and occasional-use units are 46.9% of vacant units, so the headline rate is not available supply.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 13.5% of the vacant stock, or 3.7% of all housing units against the 27.1% headline vacancy rate. That is the figure to plan an incoming employer's housing against, and the gap between the two is the redevelopment and conversion opportunity.
• Affordable rent tiers: 3 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $71,406 can pay without cost burden (~$1,785/mo), and 31.8% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Healthy participation: 70.2% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in Chugach Census Area per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

Chugach Census Area shows strong potential for water transportation attraction, with a 115.24x concentration and 157 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally.

The concentrated base spans water transportation, food manufacturing, and telecommunications, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 41.1% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.