Regional Economic Impact Analysis

Organizations use an economic impact analysis to determine the direct and indirect effects of JBLM within our South Puget Sound market or an economy and for the state, and how changes in public policy and investments affect the local, state or national economy.

Every few years, SSMCP will update its Regional Economic Impact Analysis. The last REIA was completed in 2020, and that will be updated later in 2023. This report is a collaborative effort in partnership with UW Tacoma’s Center for Business Analytics and SSMCP.

This is the third such study between the two organizations.  Due to recent growth at Amazon and Microsoft, Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM) is now the fourth-largest employer in Washington State and an essential driver to the economic momentum of Washington State and the South Sound region.

The analysis completed in 2018 focused on the JBLM military and civilian workforce and their economic impact on the South Sound region.  In 2020, the REIA expanded its impact analysis to incorporate additional data related to military retirees, working military spouses and education-related spending (Impact Aid, Tuition Assistance, GI Bill funding).  The 2020 research integrates data from previously unavailable analytic simulations (IMPLAN) that estimate direct, indirect and induced and indirect impacts and incorporates cross-region interactions.

The previous impact analysis estimates that, at the state level, JBLM’s presence contributes to nearly 100,000 full-time equivalents (FTEs) who earned nearly $9B in salary/wages to produce almost $14B in gross output that translated into over $2.25 in revenue for federal, state and local governments.  In Pierce and Thurston counties, over 83,000 FTEs earned over $8.2B to generate $12.1B in total economic impact and over $2B in tax revenue.