LABOR - AVAILABILITY OF UNDEREMPLOYED WORKERS
In June of 2004, The Pathfinders, a site selection consulting firm from Dallas, Texas, completed a workforce study of west central Indiana. The study focused on Clay, Fountain, Montgomery, Owen, Parke, Putnam, Sullivan, Vermillion, Vigo and Warren Counties in Indiana. Three counties in Illinois were also surveyed as part of the study. Both individuals and companies were surveyed.
The results indicated the following:
* A new employer should be able to attract employees from a pool of about 26,910 UNDEREMPLOYED workers in the 19-54 age group, 13,300 unemployed workers that are seeking work, and 6,300 who are not working but contemplating re-entering the workforce. Including those underemployed aged 55 and older, a total of 49,500 workers are available for employers.
* Those workers posses the skills, experience, and education to qualify them for pay rates at which they would take a new job ranging from less than $7.99 to over $31.00 per hour.
* Nearly 50% would take a better job, if offered by a new employer and who posses the skills, education and experience to qualify them for the job, for less than $14.75 per hour.
* Over 31% of those individuals have some college, 13% have an associate degree and more than 19% have a 4-year college degree or more. As these data relate only to those underemployed, they will vary from data representative of the population as a whole.
* Previous experience includes manufacturing/assembly at 58%; industrial operations at 43%, warehouse/distribution at 55%, and office/data processing at 50%.
* The area workforce received high marks for productivity with more than 95% of the companies surveyed reporting productivity as excellent (32%) or good (63%). Many of the companies interviewed stated that their local operation compared favorably or surpassed operations in other locations in terms of profitability and production.
* Most companies, 80%, reported turnover to be low, in addition, 74% reported absenteeism to be low.