Hunterdon County, New Jersey

• Income premium: Households earn well above the national median, supporting strong retail and housing markets.
• Cost of living erodes income: Local prices run 12.6% above the national average, so the nominal median of $141,715 is worth $125,857 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at metro level, not county level.
• Talent advantage: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment exceeds the national average by 21.7 pts, supports knowledge-economy and tech attraction.
• Aging population: Median age of 46 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 6,375 workers (19.5% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $70,944. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 6,291 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $9.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $114,538 while Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation averages $26,684, a 4.3x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Crop Production concentrates at 5.29x 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 36.5% 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 3.6x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 85.1% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Rent affordability gap: None of the 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $64,253 can pay without cost burden (~$1,606/mo), and 43% of renter households are already cost-burdened, 25.7% severely so; workforce housing cost burden warrants attention.

• Succession risk is real: 28.3% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Healthy participation: 64.6% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in Hunterdon County per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

Hunterdon County shows strong potential for crop production attraction, with a 5.29x concentration and 873 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 28.3% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans crop production, insurance carriers and related activities, and chemical manufacturing, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 36.5% of the employment across them, the largest being resident household spending. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.