Economics and the environment are, at their core, about people.
Previously, the Cherokee Scout’s multi-part series “Cherokee County: By the numbers” reported about demographics. A lot of that data is also relevant to the county’s economy as well as the environment.
That data includes:
u Cherokee County is remote. It is closer to five state capitals than it is to its own state capital:
Atlanta – 119 miles.
Nashville, Tenn. – 223 miles.
Columbia, S.C. – 229 miles.
Montgomery, Ala. – 275 miles.
Frankfort, Ky. – 307 miles.
Raleigh – 358 miles.
Tallahassee, the state capital of Florida, isn’t much farther at 386 miles. Charleston, the state capital of West Virginia, is 396 miles.
Murphy is the westernmost county seat in North Carolina. (Manteo in Dare County is the easternmost. It and Murphy are connected by U.S. 64.)
- Cherokee County is growing. Almost all the counties bordering Tennessee show growth, including Cherokee (7.9%), Haywood (8.1%), Madison (1.5%), Yancey (4.8%), Watauga (11.5%) and Ashe (1.9%). The exceptions are Graham (-9.2%), Swain (-5.4%), Mitchell (-2.6%) and Avery (-2%) counties.
Moderate growth is taking place in neighboring Macon (11.4%) and Clay (11.9%) counties – more robust than Cherokee. Around Asheville, Buncombe (10.7%) and Henderson (Hendersonville) (10.7%) are growing at faster rates than Cherokee.
- Cherokee County tech-savvy (relatively speaking). Cherokee ranks 70th for broadband internet access, with 79.2% having it. That may seem like an underwhelming number, but it is five percentage points better than it was in 2014.
The biggest challenge is Cherokee County’s rugged geography.
Grant funds have given broadband providers incentive to bring broadband internet to outlying communities, so the numbers should be significantly better in next year’s report. The county’s standing in the state may not change significantly, however, since much of rural North Carolina is benefiting from the same programs.
Access to computing devices ranks Cherokee County 41st in the state. Compare that to its North Carolina neighbors: Clay ranks 60th, Macon ranks 67th and Graham ranks near the bottom at 98th.
- Cherokee County faces high poverty. Poverty has been a longtime chronic problem in North Carolina’s Appalachian region. It is why there are programs like Tennessee Valley Authority, which brought electricity to Appalachia in the first half of the 20th century, and Appalachian Development Highway System, which created paved roads and highways and continues to steer highway development in the region.
Still, poverty remains an issue.
Cherokee County has unenviable rankings for per capita income, average weekly wages and child poverty. The county also ranks low in average weekly wage – 88th.
While Macon and Jackson counties have similarly poor average weekly wage ratings, they perform better than Cherokee County in child poverty.
- Cherokee County is educated. Cherokee ranks well in education: for adults without a high school diploma – 22nd best in the state, at 8% of the population.
Data tracks the number of residents ages 16-24 who are neither in school nor working full or part time. This demographic is described as “Opportunity Youth.”
Cherokee County ranks second in the state for “Opportunity Youth,” with just 5.3% of the population falling within that category.
- Cherokee County residents are old, and the trend is continuing. Cherokee has the second-oldest population in North Carolina with a median age of 52.2, just behind Brunswick County on the south coast (53.5). Both have significant populations of retired residents.
In 2014, Cherokee County ranked eighth for median age, when it was 49.4. Since 2014, Cherokee’s median age has increased by almost three years and overtaken Chatham, Greene, Hyde, Mecklenburg, Orange and Wake counties.
Cherokee County has among the highest percentages of population ages 65 and older, ranking fourth in the state. Transylvania County ranked first, Clay County second and Brunswick County third.
Just shy of one-third of Cherokee County’s population – 32% – is ages 65 or older.
Predictably, because it ranks second highest for median age and fourth for population ages 65 and older, Cherokee County ranks near the bottom for population under age 18 – 92nd. Clay is right behind at 90th, followed by Macon at 79th. With relatively younger populations, Graham County ranked 27th, while Swain County ranked ninth.
- Some data relevant to economics and environment will be reported in the next installment of “By the numbers,” which includes property tax rates. However, for now, here is data specific to economics and environment.
- Low gross domestic product. GDP measures the size of a county’s economy and is a relatively new economic indicator, first released by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis in 2019.
Areas of high GDP are, predictably, centered around the state’s most populous regions – around Charlotte and Raleigh, along the Interstate corridor west of Wake County, around Mecklenburg County, and around Cumberland County (Fayetteville and Fort Liberty). Other strong areas include Buncombe County (Asheville) and its neighbor, Henderson County; Pitt County, location of East Carolina University; Onslow County, location of two Marine Corps bases; and New Hanover County, location of Wilmington.
Cherokee County ranks 75th in the state for GDP – right at the bottom quarter of the state. But it is not alone among western counties. Except for Buncombe and Henderson counties, you have to go to Burke and Cleveland counties on the edge of Mecklenburg County’s influence of find areas of higher-ranking GDP.
The western region is dominated by counties in the bottom half of GDP. Cherokee County performs better than Swain (77th), Graham (94th) and Clay (96th) counties, but trails Haywood (46th), Transylvania (52nd), Jackson (55th) and Macon (59th) counties.
- Low income. Cherokee County ranks near the bottom in per capita income, according to average annual income per resident (2022 data). It ranks 98th of the state’s 100 counties, worse than nearby and next-door neighbors Graham (93rd), Clay (86th), Jackson (75th), Macon (53rd).
Cherokee County per capita income was $40,021 in 2022, 69% of the state average of $58,109. Chatham County ranked first at $79,769.
Cherokee County ranks slightly better in average weekly wage, which uses 2023 data. This measure excludes some work categories, including members of the armed forces and self-employed as well as private household workers.
For average weekly wage, Cherokee ranked 88th, worse than all its next-door and nearby neighbors – Graham (60th), Clay (58th), Macon (62nd), Swain (51st) and Jackson (53rd) counties.
The average weekly wage in Cherokee County was $832, which is 66% of the statewide average of $1,262. Durham County ranked first at $1,767.
- Agriculture land. The rugged mountains of western North Carolina are not well-suited for large-scale agriculture, which the Coastal Plain counties dominate. Cherokee and surrounding counties near the bottom in rankings for agriculture land.
Cherokee County ranks 85th in the state, with 25,410 acres of agriculture land recorded in 2022, the latest figures available. Cherokee has lost 3% of its agriculture land since 2017, when it ranked 51st in the state.
Cherokee County has 246 farms and is ranked 68th in the county, an 11% drop since 2017 when it ranked 61st in the state.
Nearby, Clay County ranked 93rd, with 14,515 acres, an increase of 16% since 2017, although it had a higher ranking then, when it came in at 14th in the state. Clay has 178 farms and is ranked 79th, a 9% increase but a decrease from when it ranked ninth in the state.
Macon County ranked 89th in the state with 21,973 acres, up 11% since 2017 when it ranked 19th in the state. It has 346 farms, 53rd in the state, up 2% from 2017 when it ranked 19th in the state.
Graham County, perhaps the most rugged and isolated county in the state, ranked 98th in agriculture with just 2,256 acres of ag land, down 79% since 2017, when it ranked 99th in the state. Since 2017, Graham recorded one of the sharpest declines in the state in agriculture acreage.
Graham County has 70 farms, ranking it at 97th in the state, a 43% decrease since 2017, although an improvement since then, when it ranked 99th.
Swain County ranked 97th in agriculture acreage, right behind Graham County, with 3,930 acres of ag land, a decrease of 61% since 2017, when it ranked 98th.
Sampson County, located in the Coastal Plain in the east, ranked first in the state with 292,205 acres of agricultural land, a decline of 3% since 2017, but it ranked 50th in the state at that time. Its rise in ranking despite a slight decrease in acreage is due to drops in agriculture acreage in a majority of other counties in the state – 58 out of 100.
Statewide, there is 8.1 million acres of agriculture land, down 4% since 2017.
Next: “By the numbers” concludes with taxation.
