Jay County, Indiana

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Elevated poverty: At 14.4%, the rate is in distressed-county territory and supports federal funding narratives (CDFI, NMTC, EDA).
• Talent gap: Bachelor's-or-higher attainment trails the national average by 22.4 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.

• Largest sector: Manufacturing employs 2,680 workers (57.2% of the top displayed sectors), at an average wage of $57,579.
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $61,787 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $18,160, a 3.4x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Animal Production and Aquaculture concentrates at 30.80x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 8 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 2.1x is well below the ~4.1x national average; supports talent attraction and family settlement narratives.
• High home ownership: 79.9% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 12.3% vacancy rate; potential opportunity for redevelopment or repositioning.
• Broadly affordable rents: All 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$1,374/mo), a clear cost-of-living advantage for workforce attraction.

• Succession risk is real: 23.4% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Strong participation: 81.9% labor force participation among working-age residents indicates an engaged, available workforce.
• Talent pipeline: 6 local institutions feed the workforce; the top three combined produce 59,581 annual credentials.

Jay County shows strong potential for animal production and aquaculture attraction, with a 30.80x concentration and 373 jobs in this sub-sector, it ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 23.4% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across animal production and aquaculture, transportation equipment manufacturing, and support activities for agriculture and forestry creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.

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