Cook County, Minnesota

• Talent advantage: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment exceeds the national average by 10.9 pts, supports knowledge-economy and tech attraction.
• Aging population: Median age of 53 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest sector: Accommodation and Food Services employs 634 workers (50% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $34,833.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $388M (2024).

• Top specialization: Accommodation concentrates at 12.68x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 4 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, suggesting an interconnected industrial base rather than reliance on a single employer or sector.

• In line with national: Home value to income ratio of 4.6x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 77.7% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 55.4% 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.
• Broadly affordable rents: All 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$1,816/mo), a clear cost-of-living advantage for workforce attraction.

• Succession risk is real: 29.9% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Short commutes: 16.6-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 41,393 annual credentials.

Cook County shows strong potential for accommodation attraction, with a 12.68x concentration and 413 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 29.9% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across accommodation, gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and construction of buildings creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.