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ILLINOIS EMPLOYERS
ANNOUNCE 600 LAYOFFS IN JUNE
Illinois Policy Institute
Illinois’
June WARN report shows 600 mass layoffs for the state in June, with 44
jobs lost in manufacturing, an improvement over May’s 1,300 layoffs and
500 manufacturing job losses.
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 Illinois employers announced 600 layoffs in June, including 41 GE Capital
workers whose jobs are being cut as the company rolls back its financial
services business, and 44 manufacturing workers whose jobs are moving across
state lines to Indiana.
These data come from the June Illinois Worker Adjustment and Retraining
Notification, or WARN, report, which is limited in scope to covering large
layoffs that occur in Illinois. WARN report data are not necessarily reflective
of the general economy.
Enjoy Life Foods, a subsidiary of Mondelez International Inc., plans to move to
Indiana before the end of the year. The company announced 44 additional layoffs
at its current Schiller Park, Ill., location.
The 44 June manufacturing losses are far fewer than in May, which saw more than
500, but the Enjoy Life Foods departure for Indiana is all too familiar in a
state that has watched businesses leave for friendlier environments elsewhere.
Manufacturing workers in Indiana make more than their Illinois counterparts when
adjusted for the cost of living, and their employers are not faced with the
broken workers’ compensation system and highest property taxes in the region as
they would be in Illinois. And Illinoisans know this: Indiana saw a population
increase of more than 21,000 from July 2014 to July 2015, while Illinois lost
more than 22,000 residents during the same year, with one person leaving every
five minutes.
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 Zebra Technologies in Lincolnshire is also cutting 66 jobs, as it
moves its distribution operations to a third-party logistics firm in
the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Texas saw a 2015 net migration increase
of 271,600, which was the second-highest in the nation, behind only
Florida. Businesses and job seekers moving to Texas face a lesser
tax burden than they would in the Land of Lincoln, which has the
fifth-highest state and local tax burden in the nation.
Illinois layoffs have fluctuated over the first half of 2016 –
large-scale layoffs declined each of the first four months of this
year, before spiking to more than 1,300 in May and dropping to 600
in June. But what is consistent is that blue-collar and
working-class jobs continue to leave the state. And as the state
continues its slow recovery from the Great Recession, it is likely
replacing many full-time, high-quality jobs with part-time work.
It’s clear from the job losses in the first half of this year that
Illinois needs to adopt pro-growth reforms if it wants to alleviate
the pain felt by blue-collar workers across the state. With
friendlier business climates just across Illinois’ borders,
employers have little reason to stay in a state that isn’t working
for them.
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