Jefferson County, Pennsylvania

• 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 $19,285 (24.7%) under the Pennsylvania median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Elevated poverty: At 14.1%, 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 17.3 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Aging population: Median age of 44 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 3,622 workers (31.9% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $59,521. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 1,729 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Mining, Quarrying, and Oil and Gas Extraction averages $109,196 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $16,263, a 6.7x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Wood Product Manufacturing concentrates at 10.12x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 13 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, but 68.6% of the employment across them depends on one source of demand: goods manufacturing. Read the count as depth within that single demand base rather than as spread across separate ones.
• Attraction whitespace: 4 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 2.4x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 74.9% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 16.9% of housing units are vacant, above the Pennsylvania rate of 9.2%, and down from 18.8% in 2019.
• Mostly second homes: seasonal, recreational and occasional-use units are 48.9% of vacant units, so the headline rate is not available supply.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 7.6% of the vacant stock, or 1.3% of all housing units against the 16.9% headline vacancy rate. Absorbable supply for an incoming employer is thin, and the gap between the two is the redevelopment and conversion opportunity.
• Affordable rent tiers: 2 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $36,390 can pay without cost burden (~$910/mo), and 37.6% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 26.3% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Low participation: 57.8% labor force participation against a labor force that grew 0.4% between 2019 and 2024, so workforce development programs may unlock additional supply.

Jefferson County shows strong potential for wood product manufacturing attraction, with a 10.12x concentration and 400 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 26.3% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

Most of the employment across the concentrated sub-sectors traces back to a single source of demand. Goods manufacturing accounts for 68.6% of it, with fabricated metal product manufacturing the largest single sub-sector at 35.2%. Recruitment that widens the demand base changes that exposure; recruitment inside the same base deepens it.