York County, Nebraska

• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 10.0 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest sector: Manufacturing employs 1,032 workers (22.8% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $75,356.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $1.2B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Wholesale Trade averages $78,628 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $19,729, a 4.0x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Support Activities for Agriculture and Forestry concentrates at 11.34x 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: 4 sub-sectors register LQ < 0.5, candidates for diversification or recruitment depending on labor-market fit.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 2.4x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 75.5% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 10.3% 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 (~$1,944/mo), a clear cost-of-living advantage for workforce attraction.

• Succession risk is real: 22.8% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Short commutes: 13.0-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 12,952 annual credentials.

York County shows strong potential for support activities for agriculture and forestry attraction, with a 11.34x concentration and 212 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 22.8% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across support activities for agriculture and forestry, gasoline stations and fuel dealers, and crop production creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.