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Oklahoma City’s Growth Mirage: Jobs, Pipelines, and OKANA · The 405 Payroll

• 0:13
  Four thousand five hundred jobs.
• 0:16
  That, uh, that is the big shiny number the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber tossed out
• 0:21
  for the 2026 economic forecast.
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  A zero point six percent employment growth rate.
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  And on paper, you know, paired with a pretty tight three point two percent
• 0:32
  unemployment rate, it sounds like smooth sailing, right?
• 0:35
  It sounds like, hey, we are steady, we are safe, nothing to see here.
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  But I gotta be honest, when I, when I open up local four zero five job boards late
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  at night just browsing around, the listing turnover feels totally frozen.
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  It feels stuck.
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  You see national job postings ticking up by eight percent, but locally?
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  Flat.
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  Practically a flatline.
• 1:00
  So, so you have to ask yourself, is Oklahoma City actually resilient right now,
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  or are we just secretly stagnant?
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  I mean, look at where the actual money is moving.
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  Non residential construction is booming up twelve percent, which is great if you are
• 1:17
  wearing a hard hat or running a crane.
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  But white collar office hiring?
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  It is stalling out hard.
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  Now, the Chamber will point right back to 2025 and say, wait a second Miles,
• 1:29
  look at the stats.
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  They had one hundred thirteen Chamber assisted expansion projects,
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  with an average salary of sixty thousand seven hundred dollars.
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  And currently, 121 companies were actively considering relocating to or expanding in
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  the Greater Oklahoma City region.
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  That is a real pipeline, right?
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  121 companies.
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  But here is the catch, here is the hinge that nobody wants to talk about on the
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  news.
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  Seventy percent of those active prospects are in manufacturing.
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  Seventy percent!
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  So, so what happens to the broader corporate landscape?
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  If we are betting almost the entire future of the regional economy on industrial
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  reshoring and warehouse footprint expansions, where does that leave tech?
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  Where does that leave corporate headquarters, or professional services,
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  or the kind of high density office jobs that build a thriving downtown core?
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  We are leaning so heavily into hard hat growth that if supply chains hiccup or
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  federal manufacturing incentives dry up, that whole 121 company pipeline starts
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  looking a lot more fragile than the press releases suggest.
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  And that brings us right to the big marquee headline in town,
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  the massive four hundred million dollar OKANA Resort and Indoor Waterpark over in
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  the Horizons District.
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  Mayor David Holt called it a quantum leap forward for the city.
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  And look, visually, it is stunning.
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  They brought in five hundred initial jobs just to get the doors open.
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  And, uh, according to the official impact projections, In its first year of
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  operation, OKANA is projected to support 800 direct and indirect jobs.
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  That sounds enormous.
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  That sounds like an economic engine roaring to life, right?
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  But let us actually do the math on the payroll reality.
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  That projected first year operational payroll comes out to twenty three point one
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  million dollars.
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  Divide twenty three point one million across eight hundred direct and indirect
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  roles, and what are you left with?
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  You are looking at average compensation that is, uh, well, it is firmly in the entry
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  level service sector range.
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  Compare that twenty three point one million operational payroll to the peak
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  construction payroll on the site, which hit a staggering eighty point seven million
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  dollars.
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  So when the hard hats leave and the water slides turn on, we are swapping eighty
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  million dollars in high wage skilled trade labor for twenty three million dollars in
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  resort hospitality shifts.
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  Is that really a quantum leap, or is it just replacing heavy construction dollars
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  with service wages?
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  Now, to be fair, you have to look at how this was built.
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  Governor Bill Anoatubby and the Chickasaw Nation put serious sovereign enterprise
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  capital into this development.
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  They are investing heavily in long term community infrastructure that non tribal
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  private developers simply would not touch at this scale.
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  That sovereign commercial investment fundamentally alters the local labor market
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  dynamics in a really fascinating way, because it brings stability and long haul
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  tourism vision.
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  But as Forward OKC VII rolls out its focus on talent development,
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  the big lingering question is how we bridge this widening gap.
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  How do we build a pipeline that moves workers from low wage hospitality roles into
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  high skill, high wage industrial jobs before that construction momentum tapers off
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  entirely?
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  Because if we do not solve that puzzle, all the glittery ribbon cuttings in the
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  world won't keep the broader engine running.
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  Anyway, that is the breakdown for today.
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  Talk to you soon.