Poweshiek County, Iowa

• 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 $7,668 (10.2%) under the Iowa median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 12.2% below the national average, so the nominal median of $67,391 is worth $76,755 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at state level, not county level.
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 8.4 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 1,593 workers (28.5% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $57,515. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 838 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.7B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $108,520 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $18,163, a 6.0x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction concentrates at 6.19x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 6 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 30% of the employment across them, the largest being finance and insurance. 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 3.1x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 71.2% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 13% of housing units are vacant, above the Iowa rate of 8.5%, and down from 15% in 2019.
• Mostly second homes: seasonal, recreational and occasional-use units are 51.8% of vacant units, so the headline rate is not available supply.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 10.8% of the vacant stock, or 1.4% of all housing units against the 13% headline vacancy rate. Absorbable supply for an incoming employer is thin, 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 $44,232 can pay without cost burden (~$1,106/mo), and 36.8% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Healthy participation: 62.1% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Short commutes: 18.6-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 1 institution in Poweshiek County awards 558 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Poweshiek County shows strong potential for heavy and civil engineering construction attraction, with a 6.19x concentration and 462 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally.

The concentrated base spans heavy and civil engineering construction, crop production, and gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 30% of the employment across them, the largest being finance and insurance. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.