New Hanover County, North Carolina

• Income near the national median: Median household income tracks the national median, indicating a broad-based consumer market.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 3.6% below the national average, so the nominal median of $75,166 is worth $77,973 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 9.7 pts, supports knowledge-economy and tech attraction.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 22,549 workers (22.1% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $68,780. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 14,377 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $21B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $110,075 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $25,213, a 4.4x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Nonmetallic Mineral Product Manufacturing concentrates at 3.44x the national norm, strong concentration that anchors the local economy and supports supply-chain attraction strategy.
• Cluster depth: 9 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 38.9% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. 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 and clear the local siting screen on energy cost, freight access and land base, candidates for diversification or recruitment depending on labor-market fit.

• Stretched market: Home value to income ratio of 5.2x is well above the ~4.1x national average; attainable workforce housing may be a recruitment friction.
• Elevated vacancy: 12.7% of housing units are vacant, above the North Carolina rate of 12.5%, and down from 13.9% in 2019.
• Mostly second homes: seasonal, recreational and occasional-use units are 43.5% of vacant units, so the headline rate is not available supply.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 26.6% of the vacant stock, or 3.4% of all housing units against the 12.7% 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 $49,019 can pay without cost burden (~$1,225/mo), and 52% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Healthy participation: 65.7% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Short commutes: 20.6-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 3 institutions in New Hanover County award 7,362 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

New Hanover County shows meaningful potential for nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing attraction, with a 3.44x concentration and 1,255 jobs in this sub-sector.

The concentrated base spans nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing, lessors of nonfinancial intangible assets, and heavy and civil engineering construction, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 38.9% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.