Houghton County, Michigan

• Income gap: Households earn meaningfully less than the national median, which directly affects retail demand, housing absorption, and tax base.
• Elevated poverty: At 16.5%, 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 -1.5 pts, relevant for advanced-services attraction strategy.
• Young population: Median age of 32 is materially below the U.S. norm, a workforce pipeline asset.

• Largest sector: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 1,792 workers (22.0% of the top displayed sectors), at an average wage of $61,236.
• Wage stratification: Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services averages $79,155 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $18,297, a 4.3x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Forestry and Logging concentrates at 15.17x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 9 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.

• Affordable market: Home value to income ratio of 2.7x 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: 24.2% vacancy rate; potential opportunity for redevelopment or repositioning.
• Affordable rent tiers: 4 of 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$1,472/mo).

• Strong participation: 76.6% labor force participation among working-age residents indicates an engaged, available workforce.
• Short commutes: 15.6-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 6 local institutions feed the workforce; the top three combined produce 35,780 annual credentials.

Houghton County shows strong potential for forestry and logging attraction, with a 15.17x concentration and 56 jobs in this sub-sector, it ranks in the top decile nationally.

The interconnected base across forestry and logging, construction of buildings, and computing infrastructure providers and data processing creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.

Community Data Widgets
That Actually Impress

Embed premium dashboards that make site selectors stop scrolling. 20+ federal sources. Dark, light, and brand themes. One script tag. Included with CRM or standalone.