Wayne County, Michigan

• 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 $12,336 (16.9%) under the Michigan median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Elevated poverty: At 20.8%, the rate is in economically distressed territory and supports federal funding narratives (CDFI, NMTC, EDA).
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 8.1 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 120,842 workers (21.9% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $71,576. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 85,163 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $129.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $127,538 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $30,088, a 4.2x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Transportation Equipment Manufacturing concentrates at 5.68x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 11 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 33% of the employment across them, the largest being health care economy. Demand reaches this base from more than one market rather than from a single one.
• Attraction whitespace: 5 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 2.9x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• Elevated vacancy: 12.5% of housing units are vacant, above the Michigan rate of 11.8%, and down from 16.3% in 2019.
• Vacancy composition: the largest vacancy category is other vacant at 68.7% of vacant units, with seasonal and recreational use at 2.9%.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 19% of the vacant stock, or 2.4% of all housing units against the 12.5% headline vacancy rate. Absorbable supply for an incoming employer is thin, and the gap between the two is the redevelopment and conversion opportunity.
• Rent affordability gap: None of the 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $37,565 can pay without cost burden (~$939/mo), and 49.1% of renter households are already cost-burdened, 28% severely so; workforce housing cost burden warrants attention.

• Low participation: 59.2% labor force participation against a labor force that grew 1.1% between 2019 and 2024, so workforce development programs may unlock additional supply.
• Talent pipeline: the 6 largest of 22 institutions in Wayne County award 15,343 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Wayne County shows strong potential for transportation equipment manufacturing attraction, with a 5.68x concentration and 47,134 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally.

The concentrated base spans transportation equipment manufacturing, air transportation, and postal service, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 33% of the employment across them, the largest being health care economy. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.