Chatham County, North Carolina

• Income premium: Households earn well above the national median, supporting strong retail and housing markets.
• Talent advantage: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment exceeds the national average by 13.2 pts, supports knowledge-economy and tech attraction.
• Aging population: Median age of 48 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest sector: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 3,095 workers (20.1% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $48,315.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $2.9B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $92,824 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $24,097, a 3.9x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Animal Production and Aquaculture concentrates at 15.84x 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 4.7x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 80.6% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Affordable rent tiers: 4 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$2,358/mo).

• Succession risk is real: 27% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Talent pipeline: 6 regional institutions feed the workforce; the top three combined produce 28,942 annual credentials.

Chatham County shows strong potential for animal production and aquaculture attraction, with a 15.84x concentration and 558 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 27% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across animal production and aquaculture, wood product manufacturing, and furniture and related product manufacturing creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.