Doniphan County, Kansas

• 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 $247 (0.3%) under the Kansas median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 13.6% below the national average, so the nominal median of $74,028 is worth $85,681 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at metro level, not county level.
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 14.0 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 565 workers (35.5% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $75,120. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 998 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $352M (2024).
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $82,890 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $16,745, a 5.0x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction concentrates at 9.39x 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 31.9% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. Demand reaches this base from more than one market rather than from a single one.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 1.8x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 81.1% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 19.2% of housing units are vacant, above the Kansas rate of 9.2%, and up from 15% in 2019.
• Vacancy composition: the largest vacancy category is other vacant at 80.1% of vacant units, with seasonal and recreational use at 8.3%.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 10.2% of the vacant stock, or 2% of all housing units against the 19.2% 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 $44,211 can pay without cost burden (~$1,105/mo), and 26.4% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 22.4% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Healthy participation: 61.9% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Short commutes: 21.6-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 1 institution in Doniphan County awards 601 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Doniphan County shows strong potential for heavy and civil engineering construction attraction, with a 9.39x concentration and 152 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.4% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans heavy and civil engineering construction, crop production, and truck transportation, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 31.9% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.