Tipton County, Tennessee

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Cost of living stretches income further: Local prices run 7.8% below the national average, so the nominal median of $74,127 is worth $80,398 at national average prices. BEA publishes price parity at metro level, not county level.
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 15.0 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest private-sector industry: Manufacturing employs 1,868 workers (25.5% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $63,656. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 2,496 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.8B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $77,782 while Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation averages $18,181, a 4.3x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Food Manufacturing concentrates at 9.53x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 9 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 36.5% of the employment across them, the largest being resident household spending. Demand reaches this base from more than one market rather than from a single one.
• Attraction whitespace: 4 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 3.2x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 76.3% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Affordable rent tiers: 1 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom sizes sit below what a household on the median renter income of $46,006 can pay without cost burden (~$1,150/mo), and 33% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 22.5% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Healthy participation: 60.3% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in Tipton County per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

Tipton County shows strong potential for food manufacturing attraction, with a 9.53x concentration and 1,196 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.5% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans food manufacturing, specialty trade contractors, and gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 36.5% of the employment across them, the largest being resident household spending. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.