King and Queen County, Virginia

• 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 $22,701 (24.4%) under the Virginia median, so statewide income averages overstate local household buying power.
• Elevated poverty: At 17.9%, 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 17.1 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Aging population: Median age of 49 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest private-sector industry: Construction employs 135 workers (24.2% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $55,826. Every industry figure on this page is private sector; government employs a further 325 and is counted separately.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $218M (2024).
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $90,597 while Retail Trade averages $24,056, a 3.8x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Forestry and Logging concentrates at 137.85x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 11 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 26.4% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. Demand reaches this base from more than one market rather than from a single one.

• In line with national: Home value to income ratio of 3.3x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 75.7% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 14.5% of housing units are vacant, above the Virginia rate of 8.7%, and down from 22.4% in 2019.
• Mostly second homes: seasonal, recreational and occasional-use units are 54.5% of vacant units, so the headline rate is not available supply.
• Genuinely available supply: units listed for rent or for sale are 8.1% of the vacant stock, or 1.2% of all housing units against the 14.5% 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 $46,583 can pay without cost burden (~$1,165/mo), and 37.2% of renter households are measured as cost-burdened.

• Succession risk is real: 31.8% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Healthy participation: 60.1% labor force participation reflects a steady, available local workforce.
• Talent pipeline: no college, university, or technical school is located in King and Queen County per the IPEDS institutional directory, so any training pipeline serving it runs through institutions outside the county.

King and Queen County shows strong potential for forestry and logging attraction, with a 137.85x concentration and 39 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 31.8% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The concentrated base spans forestry and logging, heavy and civil engineering construction, and crop production, and no single source of demand accounts for more than 26.4% of the employment across them, the largest being construction and real estate cycle. Supply-chain recruitment has more than one demand base to work from.