The Military & Workforce Pipeline
El Paso County trains operational capacity at scale. The question isn't whether the skills exist — it's whether they ever get pointed at something people own.
"The skills are already here. The equipment is already here. What's missing is the signal from schools that this is a real path."
The Economy Here Is Not What It Looks Like on Paper
El Paso County is one of the most operationally dense military regions in the country. Fort Carson, Peterson Space Force Base, Schriever, and the Air Force Academy don't just employ people here — they shape how the whole region thinks about work, discipline, and skill.
And yet El Paso County's average weekly wage sits around $1,369 — $220 below the national average. That gap isn't about a lack of talent or work ethic. It's about where the skills end up going.
Most of the operational capacity trained here gets absorbed right back into the defense economy. That's not a bad thing. But it does mean a lot of genuinely skilled people — welders, logistics coordinators, precision technicians, fabricators — never explore what those