Local medical device companies have $2.66 billion impact

Editor’s note: This brief article is a sidebar to the longer main story “$12M in grants to fund Bartlett TCAT campus and hiring project.”

Adding a medical device manufacturing institute to Bartlett’s future didn’t happen overnight. One of many decision points was a Nov. 2015 study that surveyed 47 medical device companies in Shelby County and another three in DeSoto County, Miss.

The study showed that the industry is responsible locally for:

• 6,487 direct jobs
• 10,336 indirect jobs
• $1,249,332,225 in wages for all jobs
• $46,054,313 in taxes generated by wages and company property tax. Note: This conservative estimate does not include any sales and use taxes or local business taxes paid directly by the companies.

The total economic impact was calculated at $2,665,185,084.

This industry packs a larger-than-life punch in Shelby County, where its 47 companies make up only 0.24 percent of the business establishments, but they generate direct and indirect jobs that account for 3.5 percent of all employment in the county.

The economic output of the Medical Device Industry makes up 3.7 percent of the Shelby County Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Medical device manufacturers in Shelby County also pay average wages that are 65.7 percent higher than the overall annual average wage for the county. Shelby County has an annual average wage of $53,497 for all industries. Contrast that with these average salaries:

• $61,937, medical device distribution
• $88,660, medical device manufacturing

Younger Associates, a market research firm based in Memphis, conducted the study for the Greater Memphis Medical Device Council (GMMDC) under the auspices of the Bartlett Area Chamber and the Economic Development Growth Engine for Memphis and Shelby County (EDGE).

Written by Carolyn Bahm, Express editor. Contact her at (901) 433-9138 or via email to bartlett.editor@journalinc.com.