Letcher County, KY
Demographic and economic profile of Letcher County, KY, sourced from the US Census Bureau (American Community Survey) via Data USA.
AI Overview
Letcher County is a small eastern Kentucky county of 21,146 residents with an economy centered on extraction-based industries typical of the central Appalachian coalfields, reflected in a GDP per capita of $20,371 and median household income of $41,793. The labor market is constrained, with a labor force participation rate of just 43.2%, unemployment at 5.8%, and only 13.7% of adults holding a bachelor's degree, though median worker earnings of $32,652 pair with some of the lowest occupancy costs in the region—median home values of $70,500 and median gross rent of $651 per month. The county has shed 6.7% of its population over the past five years, carries a 26.8% poverty rate, and has a median age of 43.5, signaling ongoing demographic contraction.
Claude Sonnet 4.6 · generated Jul 6, 2026 · derived from cached Census, BEA & ACS data on this page
Population Growth (5-year)
-6.7% since 2018
Letcher County lost population at this rate over the prior 5-year ACS5 window.
Demographics
Race & Ethnicity
- White Alone20,166 (96.9%)
- Two Races Excluding Some Other Race, & Three or More Races283 (1.4%)
- Black or African American Alone128 (0.6%)
- Two Races Including Some Other Race117 (0.6%)
- Some Other Race Alone66 (0.3%)
- Asian Alone40 (0.2%)
Top Languages Spoken at Home
- 1.Spanish76
- 2.German or other West Germanic65
- 3.Chinese (incl. Mandarin, Cantonese)20
- 4.French (incl. Cajun, Haitian)7
- 5.Other Asian and Pacific Island6
Economy
Cost of Living Index
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Not yet cached
Top Industries
- 1.Educational Services, & Health Care & Social Assistance2,454
- 2.Retail Trade (Group)712
- 3.Transportation & Warehousing, & Utilities674
- 4.Public Administration (Group)632
- 5.Professional, Scientific, & Management, & Administrative & Waste Management Services434
Top Occupations
- 1.Management, Business, Science, & Arts Occupations2,307
- 2.Service Occupations1,540
- 3.Sales & Office Occupations1,271
- 4.Production, Transportation, & Material Moving Occupations987
- 5.Natural Resources, Construction, & Maintenance Occupations680
Specialized Industries (Location Quotient)
- 1.Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing & Hunting, & Mining (LQ 2.39×)266
- 2.Public Administration (LQ 1.67×)551
- 3.Educational Services & Health Care (LQ 1.61×)2,629
- 4.Retail Trade (LQ 1.37×)1,037
- 5.Transportation, Warehousing, & Utilities (LQ 1.22×)498
Housing
Education
Workforce
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More on FDI Connect
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Data: US Census Bureau American Community Survey, served via Data USA and the Census Bureau API. See each metric tile for the specific dataset.