Blake Farmer | Nashville Public Radio
Roughly 27 percent of salaries in the Nashville area now come from jobs in the health care sector. And a study published Thursday shows the city’s leading industry has become even more dominant over the last decade.
Nashville has been booming since climbing out of the recession, which is the period covered in this study conducted by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce. But no sector added as many jobs as health care — nearly 36,000.
And the overall economic impact has ballooned to a whopping $47 billion annually — a more-than 50 percent increase over the 10-year period.
These economic impact studies are conducted periodically for the Nashville Health Care Council. And for the first time, researchers break out the contributions of the city’s 18 publicly-traded companies and the typically smaller, privately-owned firms.
The small-to-medium size companies make up roughly two-thirds of the health care jobs locally as more than 100 firms have been added in the past few years for a total of more than 500.
The economic impact study also mapped the nearly 3,500 sites owned by Nashville-based health care firms. Hospitals, surgery centers and drug rehab facilities owned by local companies are in every state but North Dakota. The highest concentration is in Tennessee, but Texas and Florida are close behind — some of the largest markets for hospital giant HCA.