Welcome to the first edition of the blog for Northeast Washington Trends! The blog captures the most recent updates to the indicators on the Northeast Washington Trends website, and will be sent out on a quarterly basis. Northeast Washington Trends would like to thank the Tri-county Economic Development District, Providence Medical, and other contributors for their support of the project.
Recent Updates
In ECONOMIC VITALITY:
Per capita personal income rose nicely in 2024 in the three counties.
Per capita personal income (PCPI) is one of two broad measures of personal income; the other is median household income. Both are used to track economic progress. Per capita is an average of the entire population and based on administrative records.
For the most recent year with data (2024), average PCPI in northeast Washington was $52,530. This represents a gain of about $2,900, or 6%. This is the biggest year-over-year jump since 2021, when pandemic payments pushed the year-over-year rate to 9%.
The relative standing, however, to the U.S. has not budged. In 2024, area PCPI was 72% of the U.S. value; a decade prior it was 73%. Among the three counties, Pend Oreille has the highest income.
New business applications in the area show strong recent growth.
Business applications do not always translate into new businesses, but the fit is likely pretty close. According to Census research, the vast number will remain “non-employer” businesses, that is, without employees. The share that does convert into businesses with paid staff is less than 10%. Nonetheless, applications are the first stage for any business and an indication of entrepreneurial spirit within a county or region.
Census recorded 803 new business applications in 2024, nearly 100 greater than in the prior year. The rate of increase over the past two years has been double digits. And since the pandemic, the pace (year-over-year growth rate) in the three counties has been greater than statewide.
The shares of employment in the five largest employing sectors have remained stable for the region.
Tabulating employment shares of the largest sectors of an economy is one way of understanding its structure, and implicitly, its degree of diversification. For the three counties, the top five employing sectors have been, in order: government (mostly school districts), healthcare, retail trade, manufacturing and accommodation and food services. Of these five, only retail trade has increased its headcount share since pre-pandemic 2019, and then by only a little.
To simplify the graph, click on the items in the legend you would like to hide.
The number of residents employed declines a bit in the region.
The national and state economies have performed fairly well over the past two years. And as noted above, personal income in the three counties, on a per capita basis, showed strong increases in 2024. Yet, the gains have not recently shown up in the number of residents employed.
The average number employed last year was about 24,455. This is a slight drop from 2024 and a larger drop from the recent peak in 2019, when the estimate was 325 higher. Relatively speaking, these are small declines in residents working. And note that this measure allows residents to work out of the three-county area, either physically or remotely.
Nonetheless, as the regional economy expands, an adequate workforce will be needed. Will that be the case over the next five years?
Job creation in 2024 was muted in the three counties.
Job creation is a goal of all economic development efforts. This indicator considers the net effect: gains after job losses are factored in. This measure, unlike the immediately preceding one, covers the payroll of employers in the three counties and not necessarily residents. In other words, some of the jobs can be taken by non-residents who commute to local employers.
Some job creation took place in 2024 versus 2023, but at a more muted pace than in the preceding years. Area employers added a total of 142 jobs. The area’s annual growth rate was about equal to that of the state. All three counties posted increases in this measure, although Stevens County dominated the gains.
In EDUCATION:
The number of area students completing at least one dual credit course remains the same.
Dual credit encompasses a set of high school programs, including Advanced Placement courses, Running Start classes, College in the High School (where available) and CTE dual credit work. The courses serve to introduce high school students to the “next steps” after graduation.
Since the 2019-2020 school year, the total number of students taking these courses .in public high schools in all three counties has been largely the same. In school year 2024-25, the count was 851. The share of students completing a dual credit course in area schools remains far below the state average.
The extended graduation rate from area high schools is stable but low.
Often a student needs a bit more time to secure a high school diploma than the standard four years from 9th through 12th grade. This indicator measures the graduation rate of those who take five years to graduate. The rate is cohort based, with the number of 9th graders as the starting point and allows for both transfers in and out of the cohort. Typically, the extended rate yields a percentage two or three points higher than the “on-time,” or 4-year rate.
In school year 2024-2025, the average extended graduation rate for all high schools in the counties was 76%. This is slightly higher than nearly a decade ago. In all years, the area’s extended graduation rate is about 10 percentage points lower than the Washington average.
For years, the state of Washington has administered summary assessments of learning, first the WASL, and in the past 15 years, the Smarter Balance Assessment (SBA). The latter has three components, taken at various grades levels: English Language Arts, Science, and as measured in this indicator, Mathematics. The assessment is scored into 4 categories, with the upper two “meeting standards” and “exceeding standards.” This indicator takes up the share of public 4th, 7th and 10th grade students in the schools of the three counties who score in one of these two categories of the Math section.
In school year 2024-2025, 44% of all area 4th graders met standards on the SBA Math component. This is the best result since pre-pandemic 2017-2018, when 52% did. For 7th graders, however, in the most recent year, only 34% met standards. While better than the immediate past several years, the share is far below the results of school year 2017-2018, when 51% did. And among 10th graders last year, only 28% met standard, also far below pre-pandemic years.
To simplify the graph, click on the items in the legend you would like to hide.
In HEALTH:
The number of licensed physicians has declined in the three counties.
Rural regions typically find themselves proportionally with many fewer healthcare providers than urban areas. This reflects both a preference for many young providers to set up practice in cities as well as the natural congregation of specialists in urban centers. This indicator considers physicians. (Data on another key provider type, Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner, are available from the same source as this indicator. See the “More Info” tab on the graph.)
For the most recent year of data, 2023, Washington’s Office of Financial Management counted 69 physicians, MD and DO, in the three counties. This was higher than the preceding year, but considerably below the peak reached in 2019 of 81.
As a rate, this implies about one MD or DO per 1,000 residents. Contrast this to the state average in 2023 of 4.4 physicians per 1,000 residents. Stevens County showed the lowest rate.
In HOUSING:
Purchasing a home is typically the largest expenditure a family will make in its lifetime. Consequently, many people pay close attention to home prices in communities they live in or would like to live in. Obviously, as prices rise, demand subsides. On the other hand, rising prices can, but not always, act as an incentive for builders to provide more supply. This indicator tracks resale prices only, not new construction.
In the most recent quarter with the data for the three counties, the blended median resale price was $286,157. This is the first time in three years that the blended median price has dipped below $300,000. At the start of the pandemic (Q1 2020), the blended median was below $200,000, as the graph reveals. Clearly, the pandemic pushed up prices significantly of resale homes.
In RECREATION & TOURISM:
The state share of lodging tax redistributions grew during the pandemic but has since plateaued.
Lodging taxes typically have two components: one is a “base” share that flows to the state and is the same across all counties; the other is variable, depending on the willingness of the local accommodations industry to tax itself (or its customers). This measure is offered as a proxy of taking the pulse of visitor spending and to enable comparisons. Consequently, only the state share is considered.
In 2024, state share lodging tax totaled approximately $300,000 for the three counties. This amount has largely been the same since 2022. On a per capita basis, the state share here has remained far lower than state average. In 2024, the results were $4.37 in the three counties versus $11.53 statewide. Clearly, tourism, and visitor spending more particularly, isn’t as deeply rooted in northeast Washington as it is elsewhere.
list updated 05.26.26
New Intern Features
Janay Bowen
Hometown: San Jose, CA
Major: Professional Accounting
Expected Graduation Date: Spring 2027
Post-graduations plans: Work at a local accounting firm to become a CPA
After a few months of working on the Trends project, my favorite thing so far:
My favorite thing so far working on Trends projects is when I get into the flow state of work and I am understanding and creating spreadsheets that I know help the counties we work for.