Webster County, Missouri

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 11.4% below the national average, so the nominal median of $71,155 is worth $80,310 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at metro level, not county level.
• Elevated poverty: At 15.2%, 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 17.4 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 1,702 workers (27% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $56,951. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 1,553 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.3B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Transportation and Warehousing averages $72,623 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $20,583, a 3.5x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Fabricated Metal Product Manufacturing concentrates at 8.26x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 12 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 40.8% of the employment across them, the largest being resident household spending. 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 3.2x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 77.4% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Affordable rent tiers: 2 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $42,578 can pay without cost burden (~$1,064/mo), and 29.5% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 22.5% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Low participation: 58.6% labor force participation against a labor force that grew 10.1% between 2019 and 2024, so workforce development programs may unlock additional supply.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in Webster County per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

Webster County shows strong potential for fabricated metal product manufacturing attraction, with a 8.26x concentration and 626 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.5% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans fabricated metal product manufacturing, nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing, and gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 40.8% of the employment across them, the largest being resident household spending. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.