Seattle Economy: Tech, Trade, and Climate

The Seattle metro area — formally Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue — is the largest metro economy in the Pacific Northwest and one of the most tech- and trade-dependent in the country. It is home to the headquarters of Amazon, Microsoft (in nearby Redmond), Starbucks, Costco, Boeing's commercial-airplane division, and a long list of cloud and software companies that depend on the region's pool of engineers. The metro is also a major Pacific gateway for U.S.-Asia trade.

This is a plain-English tour of how the Seattle metro economy works. For the state-level picture, see Washington Economy. For the country-level view, see The State of the U.S. Economy and the broader Economy hub and city cluster.

How big is the Seattle metro economy?

For example, recent metro GDP for Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue has run around $520 billion, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Metro population is roughly 4.0 million, per the U.S. Census Bureau. On a per-person basis, Seattle's GDP is among the highest of any metro in the country.

The biggest industries

A handful of sectors do most of the work in the Seattle metro economy:

• Cloud and software — Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure are the two largest cloud platforms in the world, and both are headquartered in the metro. The cluster around them includes thousands of smaller software firms.
• E-commerce and retail — Amazon, Costco, Nordstrom, and REI are all headquartered in the metro, anchoring a large corporate-retail workforce.
• Aerospace — Boeing builds 737, 767, 777, and 787 jetliners at plants in Renton and Everett. Even after the company moved its corporate HQ, the metro is still the heart of commercial-airplane production.
• Trade and logistics — the Northwest Seaport Alliance (Seattle and Tacoma combined) is one of the largest container-port complexes on the West Coast, and Seattle-Tacoma International is a top freight airport.
• Healthcare — UW Medicine, Providence, Kaiser Permanente, and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center together employ huge numbers of workers across the metro.
• Coffee and consumer goods — Starbucks is headquartered downtown, and a large independent coffee, food, and outdoor-gear cluster surrounds it.
• Higher education — the University of Washington, Seattle University, and Bellevue College anchor faculty and staff workforces and feed the tech industry.

Jobs and wages

Metro labor data is published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics West region. For example, the Seattle metro unemployment rate has typically run at or below the national average, helped by steady tech and healthcare hiring through most of the past decade.

The City of Seattle sets one of the highest local minimum wages in the country, well above Washington's statewide rate, which is itself among the highest state minimums. Many smaller cities in the metro — SeaTac, Tukwila — have set their own higher local minimums too. The latest rates are at the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries.

Cost of living

Seattle is one of the more expensive metros in the country, especially for housing. For example, recent HUD Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom in the metro has run around $2,500 a month, with downtown Seattle, Bellevue, and the Eastside higher and parts of Pierce County and South King County lower. Current county-level numbers are at HUD User.

The federal government tracks region-specific inflation data through the BLS West region. Seattle's CPI has run a touch above the national average in recent years, partly because of fast rent and grocery-price growth.

Taxes in Seattle

Washington has no state income tax, so Seattle residents pay no state or local tax on wages. Combined sales tax in the City of Seattle is 10.35%, made up of the state's 6.5% base plus city, county, and transit-district pieces — one of the highest combined sales-tax rates in any major U.S. metro. Property taxes are moderate by U.S. standards. State rules live at the Washington Department of Revenue, and you can read more about how sales tax works in our glossary.

How the Seattle metro fits into the national picture

Seattle's economy is unusually exposed to two big forces: the global cloud-computing market and U.S.-Asia trade. When enterprises around the world expand cloud spending, AWS and Azure hire here. When U.S.-China trade slows, the Northwest Seaport Alliance and Boeing's order book both feel it. The metro's tech tilt also means Seattle's wages skew unusually high for those with engineering backgrounds and unusually wide for those without.

Climate and growth

Seattle's mild marine climate and proximity to mountains, water, and the Pacific have shaped the metro's growth pattern. The city's geography — bounded by Puget Sound, Lake Washington, and the Cascades — limits how far housing can spread, which is part of why prices have risen faster than in inland metros. Federal data on regional housing supply lives at the U.S. Census Bureau.

A note on the numbers

Numbers in this article change every quarter — always check the latest from BEA, BLS, and HUD User for the most current data on the Seattle metro.