Per Capita Personal Income in Oregon’s Counties
January 10, 2025In 2023, Oregon had a per capita personal income (PCPI) of $66,839. Oregon’s PCPI ranked 21st among all states and the District of Columbia, and was 96% of the national average of $69,810, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. In Oregon, the 2023 PCPI increased by 5.8% from 2022, barely faster than the nationwide PCPI growth rate of 5.4%.
Personal income is the sum of three main components: net earnings (wages, salaries, employer contributions); personal current transfer receipts (retirement, Medicare, unemployment insurance); and income from dividends, interest, and rent. PCPI is calculated by dividing the area’s personal income by its total population.
Per capita personal income varies between states and counties, and by metro and nonmetro areas. In general, PCPI is higher in the Portland area, the Columbia Gorge, and Central Oregon. Clackamas County had the highest PCPI in 2023 at $80,105, followed by Deschutes ($79,639), Washington ($77,663), Multnomah ($74,331), and Gilliam ($70,334) counties.
The three major components of per capita personal income – net earnings; transfer receipts; and dividends, interest, and rent – make up different portions of counties’ PCPI. The largest share of personal income comes from net earnings, which accounted for 58% of Oregon’s PCPI in 2023, while both transfer receipts and dividends, interest, and rent made up 21%. In general, counties with higher PCPI have a higher share of income attributable to net earnings. Per capita net earnings made up 67% of PCPI in Washington County and 62% in Multnomah County. The share of PCPI from net earnings was lowest in Curry County, where net earnings made up just 38% of PCPI, followed by Tillamook and Baker counties (44%).
Areas with lower per capita income tend to have a higher concentration of older residents. As the population ages there are more retirements, meaning more residents who have passed their peak earning years, and therefore contribute less to the net earnings component of PCPI. Remember, PCPI represents income rather than wealth. Older residents may have substantial wealth (e.g. owning a house) but do not have as much relative income, unless it was income-generating investments that would show up in the “dividends, interest, and rent” portion of PCPI.
Counties with lower PCPI tend to have a higher share of income attributed to transfer receipts, primarily government social benefits, such as Social Security (retirement), Medicare (health insurance program for people age 65 or older), Medicaid, and unemployment insurance. The initial impulse is to presume that folks in some counties rely more heavily on government subsidies; however, the story behind the higher transfer receipts is one of age demographics.
In rural Oregon, the share of the population that is age 65 and older increased from 20% in 2013 to 24% in 2023. A higher share of retirees means a higher share of transfer receipts. The share of per capita income from transfer receipts was highest in Malheur (40%), Curry (38%), Jefferson (38%), and Wheeler (38%) counties. The lowest share of per capita transfer receipts was in Clackamas and Washington counties, both at 14%.
Income from dividends, interest, and rent was highest in Deschutes (28%), Hood River (28%), Tillamook (27%), and Benton (27%) counties. It was lowest in Morrow (10%), Gilliam (13%), and Umatilla (13%) counties.
Metro and Nonmetro PCPI in Oregon and the U.S.
Metro areas across Oregon tend to have higher per capita personal income than nonmetro areas. In 2023, nonmetro areas ($54,066) in Oregon had PCPI that was just 78% of the metro figure ($69,371). For the U.S., per capita income of nonmetro areas amounted to 75% of the metro PCPI.
Comparing metro Oregon with other metro areas across the nation, however, we see that Oregon’s metro PCPI lags the nation and has for a while. In fact, Oregon’s metro areas’ PCPI was 89% of the national metro-area PCPI in 2013 and 96% in 2023.
On the nonmetro side, Oregon’s PCPI kept pace with the national average for nonmetros. PCPI in Oregon’s nonmetro areas was 93% of U.S. nonmetro in 2013 and 100% in 2023.
As shown in the table, net earnings make up the highest share of PCPI for all areas. However, net earnings make up a higher share of PCPI for metros than nonmetros, while transfer payments make up a higher share for nonmetros than metros.
Explore more data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis at https://www.bea.gov/.