Cass County, North Dakota

• Income near the national median: Median household income tracks the national median, indicating a broad-based consumer market.
• Below the state median: Median household income runs $1,102 (1.4%) under the North Dakota median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 9.1% below the national average, so the nominal median of $75,555 is worth $83,119 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 6.9 pts, supports knowledge-economy and tech attraction.
• Young population: Median age of 33 is materially below the U.S. norm, a workforce pipeline asset.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 23,338 workers (23.4% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $74,641. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 14,796 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $19.1B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $98,908 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $26,449, a 3.7x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Truck Transportation concentrates at 2.31x the national norm.
• Cluster depth: 8 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 35.8% 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: 7 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 3.9x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• Affordable rent tiers: 3 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $46,587 can pay without cost burden (~$1,165/mo), and 38.9% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Strong participation: 75.3% labor force participation among working-age residents indicates an engaged, available workforce.
• Short commutes: 17.1-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 5 institutions in Cass County award 3,700 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Cass County shows emerging potential for truck transportation attraction, with a 2.31x concentration and 2,922 jobs in this sub-sector.

The concentrated base spans truck transportation, hospitals, and nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 35.8% of the employment across them, the largest being health care economy. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.