While Chattanooga isn’t known as the “Dynamo of Dixie” anymore, manufacturing still has a strong heartbeat.
In Hamilton County, manufacturers employ 28,500 people, with an average annual wage of $73,874, according to the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce. By comparison, the health care and social assistance sector employs 33,789 people in Hamilton County with an average annual wage of $65,403.
The Chattanooga area also is seeing an array of foreign companies increasing investment in the region. Three of the biggest business investments in the past decade have come from manufacturers headquartered outside the United States.
Germany-based Wacker Chemie has plowed more than $2.5 billion into its chemical plant in Charleston, Tennessee, in one of the biggest new business investments ever in Southeast Tennessee.
Rhea County, Tennessee, received its largest new outside investment ever from Finland-based Nokian Tyres, which has spent $700 million on its tire production plant in Dayton.