Work & the Economy
Who employs people here, what the jobs pay, and how newcomers make a living.
Downtown Bonners Ferry, from above: the Kootenai River and Highway 95 bridge. Photo: CENTURY 21 Four Seasons Realty
U.S. Census QuickFacts, July 2025 population estimate and 2020 to 2024 American Community Survey.
The honest version: jobs here are fewer and pay less than in the city, and plenty of people make it work anyway. Some bring their work with them. Some drive to Sandpoint. Some pick up a trade and never look back. Here is what the county runs on.
Boundary County has about 4,100 covered jobs and an average annual wage of about $53,700. About 4 in 10 working residents commute out of the county, most of them to Sandpoint and Coeur d'Alene, and a growing number work from home over fiber or satellite internet.
The largest employers
The Idaho Department of Labor lists these as the county's biggest employers, each with 100 to 249 employees: Boundary County School District 101, Boundary Community Hospital, Boundary County government, Idaho Forest Group at Moyie Springs, Alta Forest Products in Naples, and the Kootenai River Inn, owned by the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho. The next tier, with 50 to 99 employees each, includes Super 1 Foods, Panhandle Door, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which staffs the border ports at Eastport and Porthill.
Timber still matters. The Moyie Springs mill has run on the bluff above the Moyie River since 1929, employs more than 130 people, and can produce up to 200 million board feet a year. Alta Forest Products calls itself the largest fencing producer in the world. North of town, Elk Mountain Farms grows hops for Anheuser-Busch on about 1,700 acres, the largest contiguous hop farm in the United States, and the valley's 319 farms raise wheat, hay, canola and barley.
The gate at Elk Mountain Farms, Anheuser-Busch's hop operation north of town and one of the largest contiguous hop farms anywhere. Photo: CENTURY 21 Four Seasons Realty
The trades are a big part of it. Construction is one of the county's largest sectors, with about 490 jobs, and one of its best paid. Most of that work is small local outfits: builders, excavators, well drillers, electricians, plumbers, roofers, concrete and septic crews, along with the building supply yards, cabinet shops and metal fabricators that serve them. A good tradesman with a truck and a reputation stays booked here, and many newcomers who want to work with their hands find a place quickly.
What the jobs pay
By sector, the county's largest job counts are in education and health services (about 720 jobs, averaging $50,000 a year), trade, transportation and utilities (about 700, $49,700), manufacturing (about 600, $60,700), public administration (about 545, $64,300) and construction (about 490, $64,200). Leisure and hospitality employs about 375 people at an average of $27,800. The county unemployment rate was 4.9 percent in July 2026.
Wages run below the state average. Per capita personal income was $49,219 in 2024 against $62,323 for Idaho as a whole. That gap is part of why the median home price looks high next to local pay, and why so many buyers arrive with income from somewhere else.
Commuting and working from home
About 2,700 people both live and work in Boundary County, roughly 1,700 residents commute out, and about 1,100 come in from elsewhere. Sandpoint is 35 to 40 minutes south and Coeur d'Alene about an hour and a half, and both have larger job markets. The average commute for county residents is 18 minutes.
Remote workers are now a real part of the economy. EL Internet Northwest, Ziply Fiber and Starlink cover most of the county, but service still varies street by street, so confirm the exact address on the FCC National Broadband Map before you buy.
Starting a business
Small businesses are a large share of local employment. The Boundary Economic Development Council, in the University of Idaho Extension building at 6791 B Main Street, helps with business planning, SBA and USDA financing, site selection and state programs. The Bonners Ferry Chamber of Commerce runs the visitor center and connects new owners with the business community.
Sources: Idaho Department of Labor, Boundary County profile (August 2026); U.S. Census QuickFacts; Bonner County Daily Bee on the Moyie Springs mill; Ziply Fiber; Boundary Economic Development Council.
