By Stephen Smoot
Over the past month, the United States Census Bureau has released updated state and local profiles, as well as data sets. These numbers help to illustrate economic and population trends in Hardy County, as opposed to across the state and the nation as a whole.
It should be noted that the United States Census Bureau uses medians in some of its statistics. This is the midpoint number of a dataset, not an average of all numbers together.
In 2020, the United States Census Bureau counted 14,699 individuals in Hardy County and just under 1.8 million across West Virginia. When broken down to sets of four years of life, Hardy County followed the state. Hardy County’s median age falls at 47.3 compared to the state’s at 42.8.
That said, county numbers and state numbers alike show that the four year span with the highest number of people in it is residents between the ages of 60 and 64.
The population of foreign born in Hardy County came in at just under 1.5 percent, many of those likely Pilgrims workers and their families. This compares to 1.8 percent in the Mountain State, but nearly 15 percent nationwide. A little more than 96 percent speak English at home with three percent speaking Spanish. About .7 speak another language, but as Hardy County Schools reports, that includes Haitian dialects, Guatamalan tribal languages, and others spoken by foreign born workers and their families.
Of those foreign-born in Hardy County, about one in 10 have obtained naturalized citizenship.
Hardy County residents also tend to be older than the average West Virginian. About 23 percent have reached the age of 65 or more compared to 21.5 percent in the state and 17.7 percent nationwide.
Census numbers also tracked the movement of residents as they changed their domiciles. Just under four percent moved from one place to another within Hardy County. The same percentage moved into the area from out of state, about 1.5 percent more than moved into the state from outside of it. Only 1.3 percent moved in from a different Mountain State county, however.
Hardy County also enjoyed a higher rate of veterans living in the area at 8.9 percent. West Virginia, which has led the nation in military participation since the beginning of the Republic (researchers counted those who came from counties that became West Virginia after 1863 also) has a rate of 7.2 percent, a full percentage point higher than the United States.
Household income in Hardy County rests at a median of a little over $49,000, about $6,600 than the statewide median income. Poverty also sits at 17.6 percent, compared to 16.7 percent around the state. Approximately 28 percent of county children live in poverty.
In education, 15.7 percent of residents have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared to 24 percent across the state. That said, over seven percent have an associates. Although Hardy County shows both lower income and lower levels of college education, other local areas have shown higher salaries paired with lower levels of bachelors degrees. In northern Harrison County, about one in 10 have a bachelors degree, but the median income sits at almost $60,000 a year.
Hardy County’s public school system sees 76 percent of children enrolled, compared to 70 percent statewide.
One of the most critical criticisms of the state’s economy lies in low workforce participation. Though the state’s rate has risen in the past few years, it was at 51.7 percent in 2023. Hardy County saw a percentage almost four percentage points higher. Almost 22 percent worked in manufacturing, 17.7 in education, health care, or social assistance, 14.4 in retail, 7.4 in arts, entertainment, recreation, accommodation, and food service, 6.1 in construction, and 5.3 in agriculture, forestry, and related areas.
