Sheridan County, Montana

• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 9.5 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 sector: Retail Trade employs 155 workers (30% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $34,998.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $241M (2024).
• Wage stratification: Real Estate and Rental and Leasing averages $78,282 while Other Services (except Public Administration) averages $15,352, a 5.1x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Support Activities for Mining concentrates at 11.47x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 6 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, suggesting an interconnected industrial base rather than reliance on a single employer or sector.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 1.8x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 71.8% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 27.7% 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: 4 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$1,754/mo).

• Succession risk is real: 25.9% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Short commutes: 13.2-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 7,525 annual credentials.

Sheridan County shows strong potential for support activities for mining attraction, with a 11.47x concentration and 25 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 25.9% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across support activities for mining, gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and merchant wholesalers, nondurable goods creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.