Ross County, Ohio

• 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 $10,086 (14.1%) under the Ohio median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 7.2% below the national average, so the nominal median of $61,303 is worth $66,059 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at state level, not county level.
• Elevated poverty: At 15.7%, 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 18.3 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 5,357 workers (25.8% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $72,164. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 6,426 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $3.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $75,917 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $22,668, a 3.3x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Transportation Equipment Manufacturing concentrates at 9.78x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 10 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 41.9% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. 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.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 2.8x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• Affordable rent tiers: 2 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $38,011 can pay without cost burden (~$950/mo), and 43.2% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 22.7% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Low participation: 53.6% labor force participation against a labor force that grew 0.7% between 2019 and 2024, so workforce development programs may unlock additional supply.
• Talent pipeline: 3 institutions in Ross County award 327 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Ross County shows strong potential for transportation equipment manufacturing attraction, with a 9.78x concentration and 2,845 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.7% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans transportation equipment manufacturing, forestry and logging, and couriers and messengers, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 41.9% of the employment across them, the largest being goods manufacturing. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.