Ohio County, Kentucky

• 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 $5,928 (9.3%) under the Kentucky median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 9.8% below the national average, so the nominal median of $57,798 is worth $64,078 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 21.8 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 2,278 workers (56.1% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $53,793. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 1,705 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.1B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Information averages $70,094 while Retail Trade averages $30,995, a 2.3x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Wood Product Manufacturing concentrates at 17.87x 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 31.8% 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.

• 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: 77.2% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 11.1% of housing units are vacant, above the Kentucky rate of 10.3%, and down from 12.2% in 2019.
• Vacancy composition: the largest vacancy category is other vacant at 67.5% of vacant units, with seasonal and recreational use at 0.4%.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 12.2% of the vacant stock, or 1.4% of all housing units against the 11.1% 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: 4 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $42,217 can pay without cost burden (~$1,055/mo), and 25.8% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 22.6% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Low participation: 54.7% labor force participation. The labor force itself fell 2.2% between 2019 and 2024, from 10,569 to 10,341.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in Ohio County per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

Ohio County shows strong potential for wood product manufacturing attraction, with a 17.87x concentration and 302 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.6% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans wood product manufacturing, waste management and remediation services, and animal production and aquaculture, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 31.8% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.