STRATAHELM · COMMUNITY AI EXPOSURE & RESILIENCE INDEX

McLeod County, Minnesota

CAERI NationalMinnesota › McLeod County · FIPS 27085 · caeri:27085
36.9
CAERI score (national basis)
Bottom 25%
National percentile band
#2841
Ranked of 3142 U.S. counties
#57
Ranked in Minnesota (of 87)
High
Confidence

Two comparisons, both shown. The national basis ranks McLeod County against every scored U.S. county — its percentile band above is a relative national standing, not a condition. The in-state basis ranks it against Minnesota's other counties (rank and percentile only — bands aren't meaningful within a single state). A county can stand out in its own state while sitting mid-pack nationally. Neither is a forecast.

Pillar breakdown — national percentile ranks

P1 · Direct occupational exposure
20
P2 · Economic concentration
37
P3 · Adaptive capacity (inverted)
42
P4 · Regional buffer (inverted)
41
P5 · Fiscal sensitivity
19
Zone shading marks percentile quartiles; darker and warmer means more concerning. Capacity and buffer bars (inverted before aggregation) read mirrored — for those, a higher percentile is the safer pale end.

What this means for McLeod County

McLeod County scores 36.9 on the national CAERI basis — 2841st of 3,142 scored U.S. counties, placing it in the Bottom 25% band nationally by percentile, with a high-confidence rating. Within Minnesota it ranks 57th of 87 counties (35th in-state percentile). The score summarizes how concentrated local employment is in AI-exposed occupations against the economy's measured capacity to adapt; these are relative-standing bands, not a projection of local job change.

Direct occupational exposure stands at the 20th national percentile. The largest concentrations of locally estimated employment in high-exposure occupations are office clerks, general, customer service representatives, bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks. The share of exposed-industry jobs held by workers under 25 is 9% — below the state median of 10%; research on AI-era payrolls finds early-career roles in exposed work are where hiring patterns shift first, so this share indicates how soon exposure could be felt, not how large it is.

The share of exposed-industry jobs held by workers 55 and over is 30% (above the state median) — a higher share historically means slower workforce adjustment when industries restructure. Fiscal sensitivity ranks at the 40th state percentile. In Minnesota the transmission runs through the property-tax base — commercial-industrial property is taxed at higher classification rates than homesteads, so softness in commercial values shifts levy burden or squeezes capacity — and through state aid, 27% of general revenue here (above the state median): Local Government Aid is financed from the state general fund and moves with statewide economic conditions, not only local ones. Local-option sales taxes are a minimal share of revenue here, leaving property values and state aid as the channels that matter. Minnesota local governments levy no local income tax. All county occupation figures on this page are model-based ESTIMATES with the confidence rating shown above.

Largest locally-estimated employment in high-exposure occupations

Across all 203 high-exposure occupations (top quartile of ensemble exposure) with estimated local employment, McLeod County has an estimated 3,143 jobs — 18.8% of county employment — carrying an estimated $193M annual wage bill in high-exposure work. The five largest:

OccupationEst. local employment*Exposure (0–1)Median wage (area)
Office Clerks, General3430.44$44,150
Customer Service Representatives2470.42$43,450
Bookkeeping, Accounting, and Auditing Clerks2070.51$48,500
Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive2030.50$46,620
Sales Representatives, Wholesale and Manufacturing, Except Technical and Scientific Products1530.43$72,330
*County-level occupation figures are model-based ESTIMATES, not surveyed counts (see methodology §5 summary); every county carries the confidence rating shown above. Wage = area median.

Age structure of exposed-industry employment

McLeod CountyMinnesota median
Share of exposed-industry jobs held by workers under 25 (entry rung) 9.4%10.0%
Share of exposed-industry jobs held by workers 55+ (adjustment friction) 29.5%28.6%

🔒 City-level detail for its cities and towns

The county number above averages over every community in it. City- and place-level exposure profiles, employer-mix detail, trend monitoring, and peer benchmarking are part of the CAERI subscription for local governments and regional organizations.

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Cite this page

Canonical identifier: caeri:27085 — this URL is permanent; if the address scheme ever changes, the old address will redirect. StrataHelm. (2026). McLeod County, Minnesota — Community AI Exposure & Resilience Index (CAERI v0.3.1) [Data set]. Retrieved August 4, 2026, from https://stratahelm.com/counties/minnesota/mcleod/ “McLeod County, Minnesota — CAERI.” StrataHelm, 2026, stratahelm.com/counties/minnesota/mcleod/. Accessed 4 August 2026. StrataHelm. “McLeod County, Minnesota — Community AI Exposure and Resilience Index (v0.3.1).” 2026. https://stratahelm.com/counties/minnesota/mcleod/
Embed this county's score card — attribution to StrataHelm CAERI and the link back are part of the embedded page and cannot be stripped:<iframe src="https://stratahelm.com/counties/minnesota/mcleod/embed/" width="420" height="275" loading="lazy" title="CAERI — McLeod County, MN"></iframe>

Machine-readable: this county's JSON · national dataset download and data dictionary on the methodology page.

Nearby and comparable counties

Renville Co., MN (in state)Mower Co., MN (in state)Brown Co., MN (in state)Divide Co., ND (similar score)Henderson Co., KY (similar score)Butte Co., ID (similar score)

Links point to the economically nearest counties (in-state, and similar national score). County-level geographic adjacency is not part of the public reference data, so proximity here is by rank, not by shared border.

Sources & provenance

LayerSources (vintage)
Employment & occupation structurecbp_mn_county_naics4: Census CBP 2023 API (NAICS2017 classification; PAYANN in $1,000s; noise infusion G/H/J bands, D = withheld -&gt; NaN); county_soc_estimates.meta.json; exposure_scores: 2026-07-04; matrix_staffing_patterns: 2024-34 National Employment Matrix (base year 2024)
AI-exposure research baseAnthropic Economic Index; Felten, Raj & Seamans (AIOE); Eloundou et al. — combined as a weighted ensemble with cross-source disagreement feeding the confidence rating
Capacity, buffer & fiscalgovfin_mn_county_revenue_mix: 2022 Census of Governments, Survey of Government Finances; lodes_mn_county_flows: LEHD LODES8 OD 2023, JT00/S000; sources: mn main+aux, wi/nd/sd/ia aux; qwi_mn_county_naics3_age: Census QWI (qwi/sa), quarters [&#x27;2024-Q4&#x27;, &#x27;2025-Q1&#x27;, &#x27;2025-Q2&#x27;, &#x27;2025-Q3&#x27;], sex=0, ownercode=A05 (private), 96 NAICS-3 + &#x27;00&#x27; all-industry
MethodologyCAERI v0.3.1 · public methodology · scores generated 2026-07-12 · page generated 2026-08-04
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