Caldwell County, North Carolina

• White (non-Hispanic) 68,703 85.3%
• Hispanic or Latino (any race) 5,381 6.7%
• Black or African American (non-Hispanic) 3,262 4.1%
• Asian (non-Hispanic) 426 0.5%
• Two or more races (non-Hispanic) 2,569 3.2%
• American Indian / Alaska Native (non-Hispanic) 74 0.1%
• Native Hawaiian / Pacific Islander (non-Hispanic) 70 0.1%
• Some other race (non-Hispanic) 51 0.1%

• Under 18 15,900 19.7%
• 18–24 6,059 7.5%
• 25–44 17,893 22.2%
• 45–64 23,412 29.1%
• 65 and over 17,272 21.4%

Median household income

$59,968

90% interval $54,538–$65,398

−$14,087 vs NC · 59th of 100

Below poverty line

14.0%

90% interval 11.3%–16.7%

+1.4 pp vs NC · 55th of 100

Unemployment (12-mo)

3.7%

−0.02 pp vs. state

County GDP

$3.3B

0.39% of state

Avg. annual pay

$52,038

Establishments

1,584

• Education & health services 5,767 22.8%
• Trade, transportation & utilities 5,655 22.4%
• Manufacturing 5,650 22.3%
• Leisure & hospitality 2,276 9.0%
• Professional & business services 1,879 7.4%
• Public administration 1,520 6.0%
• Construction 1,098 4.3%
• Other services 611 2.4%
• Financial activities 504 2.0%
• Information 263 1.0%
• Natural resources & mining 68 0.3%
• Unclassified 1 0.0%

Home ownership

73.5%

+6.9 pp vs NC · 47th of 100

Median gross rent

$744

−$484 vs NC · 91st of 100

Owner-occupied

24,209

Renter-occupied

8,710

• Concentrated

  Top three sectors employ 67% of the county workforce. Most panelists likely share employer relationships within these sectors, surface those connections early in voir dire before any institutional-defendant or sector-specific framing.

• Wide wage spread

  Highest-paid sector (Information, $156,457/yr) pays 7.8× the lowest (Leisure & hospitality, $20,133/yr). Stark intra-economy class divisions on the panel; calibrate damages and lost-wages framing to that range.

• Mixed business scale

  Average establishment employs 16 workers, a mix of institutional employers and small businesses. Both employed-by-large-institution and small-business-owner perspectives are likely on the panel.

• Republican 33,009 76.0%
• Democratic 10,146 23.4%
• Other / third-party 296 0.7%

• Spanish 3,451 4.5%
• Vietnamese 135 0.2%
• German or other West Germanic 98 0.1%
• Tagalog 88 0.1%
• French, Haitian, or Cajun 68 0.1%
• Russian, Polish, or other Slavic 64 0.1%
• Arabic 3 0.0%

Households

32,919

Family households

21,792

66.2% of households

Married couples w/ children

4,539

20.8% of families

Single-mother families

2,190

10.0% of families

Veterans

4,370

6.8% of civilians 18+

• Evangelical Protestant 35,024 43.4%
• Mainline Protestant 5,084 6.3%
• Catholic 4,026 5.0%
• Black Protestant 1,304 1.6%
• Other (non-Christian + minor traditions) 811 1.0%

Health insured

89.5%

±1.1 pp

Uninsured

10.5%

±1.1 pp

41st of 100

With a disability

18.4%

±1.4 pp

30th of 100

Bachelor's or higher

18.8%

±1.4 pp

−16.9 pp vs NC · 72nd of 100

Uninsured, under 65 (2024)

11.6%

90% interval 10.4%–12.8% · Census SAHIE

The under-65 uninsured rate is not comparable to the ACS insurance figures, which cover all ages.

Trial court

36th Judicial District Superior Court

Judges

2 (Superior Court judges per primary district (general civil + felony criminal jurisdiction); District Court judges (limited jurisdiction) separate. Vintage 2026 nccourts.gov; counts cross-checked against N.C.G.S. § 7A-41.1. Where an urban county (Wake, Mecklenburg, Guilford, Forsyth) is statutorily split into multiple Superior Court districts, all sub-district seats are aggregated under the primary district number used in counties.json. ~109 Superior Court judgeships statewide.)

Court seats

Lenoir, Morganton

This judicial district spans multiple counties.

Traffic fatalities

24

37.13 per 100k adults (18+)

Fatal crashes

24