Caddo Parish, Louisiana

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Elevated poverty: At 22.4%, 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 9.7 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest sector: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 24,788 workers (31.2% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $67,801.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $17.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $87,129 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $23,542, a 3.7x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Support Activities for Mining concentrates at 8.69x 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, suggesting an interconnected industrial base rather than reliance on a single employer or sector.
• Attraction whitespace: 8 sub-sectors register LQ < 0.5, candidates for diversification or recruitment depending on labor-market fit.

• In line with national: Home value to income ratio of 3.5x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• Elevated vacancy: 15% vacancy rate. In resort, rural, and seasonal markets much of this is recreational/seasonal (second homes), not available supply; confirm the vacancy-by-reason split before treating it as a redevelopment opportunity.
• Affordable rent tiers: 3 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$1,268/mo).

• Low participation: 59% labor force participation suggests untapped capacity; workforce development programs may unlock supply.
• Short commutes: 20.4-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 6 regional institutions feed the workforce; the top three combined produce 16,131 annual credentials.

Caddo Parish shows strong potential for support activities for mining attraction, with a 8.69x concentration and 1,640 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally.

The interconnected base across support activities for mining, petroleum and coal products manufacturing, and hospitals creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.