Business

Black Owned

If you’re moving to Greater Cincinnati, you likely already have a job or you’ll be looking for one.

The good news: Opportunities abound. The 15-county Metropolitan Statistical Area’s diversified economy offers more than 59,200 private-sector places of employment—from start-ups to mom-and-pop businesses to international companies operating corporate or regional headquarters, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data show. As of August 2022, almost 1.1 million residents were employed.

The top four industry sectors, employing more than 100,000 each, are health care and social assistance; manufacturing; accommodation and food services; and retail trade, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Cincinnati metro area’s unemployment rate typically is slightly below or equal to the national unemployment rate. In August, it was 3.8%.

Wages in the Cincinnati metro area averaged $1,280 a week in the first quarter of 2022, compared with $1,374 nationally, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said in its latest update. At the same time in 2021, wages averaged $1,206 and $1,308, respectively.

Like the rest of the world, Cincinnati continues to recover from the COVID-19 economic damage. The output of goods and services in the region—real gross domestic product — was up 3.7% from 2018 to 2019 before declining by 3.6% in 2020, the most recent data compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.

By Bill Ferguson Jr.