Stephenson County, Illinois

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Below the state median: Median household income runs $19,347 (23.2%) under the Illinois median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 15.0 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Aging population: Median age of 45 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 3,278 workers (24.1% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $67,497. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 2,523 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $2.5B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Construction averages $100,417 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $20,641, a 4.9x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Animal Production and Aquaculture concentrates at 13.07x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 7 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 47.7% 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.
• Attraction whitespace: 3 sub-sectors register LQ < 0.5 with at least 50 employed, candidates for diversification or recruitment depending on labor-market fit.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 2.1x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 70.9% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Affordable rent tiers: 3 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $38,469 can pay without cost burden (~$962/mo), and 39% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 26.8% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Healthy participation: 60.6% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Short commutes: 20.7-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 1 institution in Stephenson County awards 602 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Stephenson County shows strong potential for animal production and aquaculture attraction, with a 13.07x concentration and 391 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 26.8% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans animal production and aquaculture, food manufacturing, and machinery manufacturing, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 47.7% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.