With a median household income of more than $85,000 and a home ownership rate of nearly 86 percent, Forsyth County is the "richest" county in Georgia, according to a 2015 analysis.
24/7 Wall St. compiled and compared median annual household income, estimated educational attainment, poverty, health coverage and homeownership rates, all from the U.S. Census for 2009-2013, for counties, parishes and boroughs with at least 10,000 residents. Annual unemployment rates were taken from the Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2013 figures.
Some trends prevailed across the richest counties nationally, including Forsyth: high levels of education, low levels of unemployement, and — often — a large gap between its median income and both the state's median household income and the median income of that state's poorest county.
Forsyth's $86,569 median income is nearly $40,000 more than the state average ($49,179) — and $60,000 more than the median income of Telfair County ($26,634), the poorest in the state and one of the poorest counties nationwide.
Almost 10 percent of Forsyth households make $200,000 or more. And it's tops in other ways, too: Forsyth is both the fastest growing county in the state and the healthiest.