Marion County, South Carolina

• 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 $33,023 (47.6%) under the South Carolina median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 6.3% below the national average, so the nominal median of $36,301 is worth $38,742 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at state level, not county level.
• Elevated poverty: At 30%, 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 21.2 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Aging population: Median age of 43 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 1,159 workers (26% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $57,119. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 1,651 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $901M (2024).
• Wage stratification: Utilities averages $72,140 while Retail Trade averages $27,675, a 2.6x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: General Merchandise Retailers concentrates at 2.97x the national norm.
• Cluster depth: 6 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, but 56.6% of the employment across them depends on one source of demand: health care economy. Read the count as depth within that single demand base rather than as spread across separate ones.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 2.6x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• Elevated vacancy: 16% of housing units are vacant, above the South Carolina rate of 13.3%, and down from 22.7% in 2019.
• Vacancy composition: the largest vacancy category is other vacant at 81% of vacant units, with seasonal and recreational use at 8.9%.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 4.8% of the vacant stock, or 0.8% of all housing units against the 16% headline vacancy rate. Absorbable supply for an incoming employer is thin, and the gap between the two is the redevelopment and conversion opportunity.
• Rent affordability gap: None of the 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $23,590 can pay without cost burden (~$590/mo), and 30.4% of renter households are already cost-burdened, 14.7% severely so; workforce housing cost burden warrants attention.

• Succession risk is real: 23.9% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Low participation: 48.9% labor force participation. The labor force itself fell 10.6% between 2019 and 2024, from 12,610 to 11,276.
• Talent pipeline: 1 institution in Marion County awards 15 credentials a year. Employers drawing from a wider labor shed should read this alongside institutions outside the county, which this page does not aggregate.

Marion County shows emerging potential for general merchandise retailers attraction, with a 2.97x concentration and 396 jobs in this sub-sector. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 23.9% 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. Health care economy accounts for 56.6% of it, with ambulatory health care services the largest single sub-sector at 37.5%. Recruitment that widens the demand base changes that exposure; recruitment inside the same base deepens it.