Chicago Factories are Booming, but Hiring is Not

Chicago factory owners say that there’s strong demand for their products, but that productivity gains are keeping hiring down.

Prince Industries, for example, “replaced eight temporary employees with a new Swedish laser-cutting machine” that runs constantly, according to Crain’s Chicago Business.

In Buffalo Grove, a Chicago suburb, sales are up 20 percent this year at Schultes Precision Manufacturing. But the company has reduced head count (through attrition, not firings) from 110 employees to 102 employees.

Not far south, in Indianapolis, Navistar International is using improved equipment to build a thousand engines each day using 1,200 workers at its plant–400 fewer than it needed three years ago, according to Crain’s Chicago Business.