Meet A Qualified Workforce

Waller County, and the Houston region, is home to one of the strongest, most educated, and diverse workforces in the country.

As one of the most important considerations for relocating or expanding a business, we know getting good workforce information is important to your decisions. To help you, we have provided the most current and useful workforce data on Waller County and the region.  If you would like to find real time regional data, visit the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the Houston MSA.

In addition, there are numerous resources in the region to help support your workforce through training.  For more information, visit our workforce training page.

Innovation Index - A Productive Workforce

The Innovation Index is a service of the Indiana Business Research Center at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business. This initiative is funded in part by the U.S. Commerce Department's Economic Development Administration. The index is a unique framework for economic development. It is designed to measure a community's ability to convert knowledge and innovation capacity into prosperity. It does so by measuring five areas:

  • Human Capital & Knowledge Creation

  • Business Dynamics

  • Business Profile

  • Employment & Productivity

  • Economic Well Being

Each index is comprised of several sub measurements to calculate the overall score as compared to the national median. Rankings are against the 3,143 counties in the United States. Anything above the national median is considered a strong area and each community is ranked against similar communities. Since this page provides information on labor and wage data, it was appropriate to include our index and ranking for employment and productivity.

Understanding Job Classifications for Wages

For those companies coming from outside the US, one of the more difficult transitions is understanding how to get employment data and paying employees competitive wages. Even US companies sometimes struggle with understanding wage data. Since each area will pay differently based on cost of living and competitive pressures, the best information will be local wage and employment data. All jobs are described using the Federal Department of Labor Standard Occupation Code (SOC). This provides a standardized way of comparing jobs. You can find out more information here.

Assisting You to Develop a Wage Strategy

Planning your new facility will require a significant investment in wages. We have co-developed a wage tool with Parker Harvey at Workforce Solutions. This tool was initially developed to help our office ensure companies locating in the area, and seeking incentives, were paying their employees at the regional average or above. This is information you need to ensure you maintain sufficient staff. We require companies to provide competitive wages in order to qualify for tax incentives. If you are not sure what to pay your workforce, call our office and we will help you get the information you need to analyze your wage strategy.