Forrest County, Mississippi

• 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 $2,807 (5.0%) under the Mississippi median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 12.4% below the national average, so the nominal median of $53,640 is worth $61,233 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at metro level, not county level.
• Elevated poverty: At 21%, 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 5.1 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Young population: Median age of 32 is materially below the U.S. norm, a workforce pipeline asset.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 5,444 workers (21.8% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $71,880. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 10,862 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $4.8B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Management of Companies and Enterprises averages $82,822 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $20,085, a 4.1x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Pipeline Transportation concentrates at 4.74x the national norm, strong concentration that anchors the local economy and supports supply-chain attraction strategy.
• Cluster depth: 10 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 30.7% of the employment across them, the largest being visitor economy. 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.

• 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.
• Vacancy level: 10.7% of housing units are vacant, below the Mississippi rate of 14.6%, and down from 14.9% in 2019.
• Vacancy composition: the largest vacancy category is other vacant at 57.1% of vacant units, with seasonal and recreational use at 2.4%.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 38.5% of the vacant stock, or 4.1% of all housing units against the 10.7% headline vacancy rate. That is the figure to plan an incoming employer's housing against, and the gap between the two is the redevelopment and conversion opportunity.
• Affordable rent tiers: 1 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $32,458 can pay without cost burden (~$811/mo), and 44.7% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Healthy participation: 62.6% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Short commutes: 21.2-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 4 institutions in Forrest County award 5,277 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Forrest County shows meaningful potential for pipeline transportation attraction, with a 4.74x concentration and 56 jobs in this sub-sector.

The concentrated base spans pipeline transportation, machinery manufacturing, and utilities, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 30.7% of the employment across them, the largest being visitor economy. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.