Valley’s fastest growing industry is health care

PALMER — While thousands of Mat-Su Borough residents work outside the borough’s boundaries, most — 55 percent — work here, state labor economist Neal Fried told Mat-Su Borough members at a recent presentation.

As an economist, Fried said it’s pretty clear why so many Mat-Su residents work outside the area: the average salary in the Valley is $37,000, while in Anchorage the average salary is $50,000.

“That explains why it makes sense to commute,” Fried said.

The Mat-Su Valley also is kind of an interesting anomaly in statewide statistics.

“The Mat-Su Borough is the only borough or census area in the state where more money flows into the borough than flows out,” Fried said.

He said the borough’s population growth also has fueled growth in other areas of the economy.

“Every industry in the Mat-Su Borough has grown,” Fried said.

On a state level, the fastest growing industry has been health care and social assistance. That’s true nationwide and in the Mat-Su as well. But health care here is growing faster than average.

Also growing is leisure and hospitality — bars, hotels and the like, he said.

Fried listed the top five employers of Mat-Su residents. First was the Mat-Su Borough School District, then the state of Alaska, then Mat-Su Regional Medical Center, followed by Wal-Mart/Sam’s Club. Fifth was ASRC Energy Services.

Fried said the interesting thing about that fifth employer is that the company has no office in the borough. The oilfield services company’s employees who live here all work outside the borough.

Fried also spent a significant amount of time talking about the Valley’s real estate market. He said he doesn’t usually touch on that when he goes to other areas of the state, but real estate is important to Mat-Su.

He said that, generally, home prices have been drifting down in Mat-Su, but at a slower pace than elsewhere in the country.

In raw numbers, he said, Mat-Su has in recent years been building more homes than Anchorage. It also builds more homes than the rest of the state, excluding Anchorage.

“You’re exporting housing to the rest of the state,” Fried said, using kind of an economic riddle to summarize that the Mat-Su Borough attracts residents with its housing.

From 2000 to 2011, the state as a whole grew, Fried said, but Mat-Su grew in a specifically unique way — not through birth rates, but through an influx of new residents.

“You’re really the only jurisdiction in the state that grew as a result of migration,” Fried said.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.