Josephine County, OR

County Profile

88,179 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Josephine County, OR.

Several figures AreaProfile publishes are measured by county and nowhere finer — death rates by intent among them. On this page those describe the geography they are printed on, which is not true of the city and ZIP pages that inherit them.

43out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 3% of 1,225 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity1110th of 1,255 counties34
Schools551st of 973 counties45
Growth888th of 1,226 counties38
Housing affordability1206th of 1,255 counties54
ClimateTop 48% of 1,254 counties69
Physical resilience1170th of 1,255 counties18
Access808th of 1,255 counties74
Economic stability1000th of 1,255 counties41
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published profiles: unemployment is 7.4% and the Opportunity signal places Josephine County in the bottom 12%.

Buying strains local incomes far more than renting does — the median home is 6.7 times median household income, against a historic benchmark near three — while rent takes 24% of it.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by inland flooding, wildfire and earthquake.

At a glance

Population
88,179
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$60,098
Bottom 36% nationally
Density
54/sq mi
1638.6 sq mi of land
Median age
47.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Josephine County
Oregon
Metro area
Grants Pass, OR
Nearest major airport
MFR
36 mi · Rogue Valley Intl/Medford
Median home value
$404,300
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 7.4% is lower than 2% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment held steady over the past year, at 33,265 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$3,546$60,098Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,801$35,179Top 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate15.6%Top 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute22.7 minBottom 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher19.7%Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment33,265Bottom 43%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.1%Bottom 49%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-0.0%Top 33%June 2026
Labor force35,936Bottom 44%June 2026
Labor force participation49.7%Bottom 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.1%Top 44%June 2026
Unemployment rate7.4%Top 2%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/067.44.9
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 7.4% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202460k52k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $60,098 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Grants Pass, OR
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides4,640$53,120
Fast Food and Counter Workers1,240$34,900
Cashiers760$34,080
Retail Salespersons740$36,940
Stockers and Order Fillers670$36,500
Teaching Assistants, Except Postsecondary560$38,140

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

24% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 46% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 19.5 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
26
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
19.5
across all schools here
Math proficiency
24.0%
Bottom 35% in Oregon
Reading proficiency
45.7%
Top 20% in Oregon
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Grants Pass High SchoolGrants Pass SD 71,65822.1
North Middle SchoolGrants Pass SD 767318.7
South Middle SchoolGrants Pass SD 761020.3
Hidden Valley High SchoolThree Rivers/Josephine County SD52222.7
Redwood Elementary SchoolGrants Pass SD 744319.3
North Valley High SchoolThree Rivers/Josephine County SD42422.3
Allen Dale Elementary SchoolGrants Pass SD 739718.0
Lincoln Elementary SchoolGrants Pass SD 738619.3
Fleming Middle SchoolThree Rivers/Josephine County SD38122.422%
Evergreen Elementary SchoolThree Rivers/Josephine County SD37818.925%45%
Parkside ElementaryGrants Pass SD 736115.7
Riverside Elementary SchoolGrants Pass SD 735116.7

83.3% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Oregon’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,194 takes 24% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 6.7 times median household income here, well above the historic benchmark, at a level conventionally described as seriously unaffordable.

Rent as a share of income
23.8%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
6.7×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,194
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$404,300
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income6.73Top 2%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate71.7%Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±4939,503Top 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$51$1,194Top 17%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$14,314$404,300Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income23.8%Top 6%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate7.1%Bottom 14%2024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
38/ 100
Ranks 888 of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing — 2 consecutive years, measured from 2022 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has been broadly flat since 2020, at 88,276 in 2024.

At 2.6 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
229
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
2.6
Bottom 45% nationally
Year over year
−9%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
35.4%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202489k88k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
2022202320242025338209
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2022 (−13%).

Weather & climate

4 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 77°F and January a low of 33°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 40.7 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 29, in the Good band, and about 8 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

20°40°60°80°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station SEXTON SUMMIT, 18.1 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND8.1"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index60.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation40.7"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low33°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high77°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months41991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10082024 calendar year
Median air quality index29.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing29°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
29
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
60
90th percentile index
Days above 100
8
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

18 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, wildfire and earthquake.

WildfireHigh
EarthquakeElevated
Inland floodingHigh
Heat waveModerate
AvalancheModerate

Low or minimal exposure: landslide, winter weather, lightning, hail, drought, ice storm, volcanic activity, strong wind, tornado, cold wave.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA National Risk Index county record. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Josephine County records 9.7 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, higher than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 29.6 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 27.3 per 100,000 residents in Josephine County.

Homicide
9.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
29.6
per 100,000 residents
Drug overdose
27.3
per 100,000 residents
Suicide
26.2
per 100,000 residents

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Josephine County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Josephine County rather than Josephine County itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

1 major airport lies within 100 miles, the nearest 36 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Rogue Valley Intl/MedfordMFR36 mi8,800 ft
Mahlon Sweet FldEUG121 mi8,009 ft
Portland IntlPDX226 mi11,000 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

Customize your score

What matters to you?

Choose what you weight most heavily. Nothing is saved to an account — your preferences stay in this browser, and the Area Score never changes.

Area Score
43
Your Score

Select one or more priorities to see how this location scores against them.

Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

Cities in Josephine County, OR