The Industry

Northeast Illinois is one of the largest logistics hubs in the world and the industry shows no signs of slowing.

Our region is a national hub due to our location in the heartland making us indispensable in the national supply chain.  In fact, Will County, just south of Chicago’s Cook County, is home to the Centerpoint Intermodal Center , the largest inland port in North America. 

In 2017, an incredible 3.5% of the nation’s GDP moved through Will County warehouses. Since then, the transportation and logistics industry here continues to be the fastest growing industry in Will County and among the fastest-growing industries in Chicago. 

Soon, to complement the Centerpoint Intermodal Center, Northpoint Development’s Third Coast Intermodal Hub will add another 1,200 acres of intermodal-adjacent warehousing to Will County. On top of that, the future Peotone cargo airport will allow companies like Amazon, which has multiple locations in Will County, to move products with increased speed and efficiency by air, on rail and over road. 

Northeast Illinois is also home to seven Class I rail carriers with more than 1,300 freight, passenger, and commuter trains passing through the region daily. What’s more is that Illinois has the third-most interstate routes – an IL driver can reach almost every population center in the nation by using only one interchange.

In 2009, much of the warehouse boom was concentrated in Cook, Will, and Kankakee counties; now, industry is expanding to surrounding counties like McHenry, seeking more labor from new workers as it goes. 

Industry leaders are taking advantage of vulnerable workers.

Since WWJ was founded in 2008, much has changed and much remains the same. Warehouse work remains essential, yet routinely undervalued by greedy bosses who put profit over people. As the transportation and logistics industry grows, many of the challenges that warehouse workers and their families have faced for over a decade persist. Despite enormous efforts to create necessary change in the industry, warehouse jobs are still low-paying and most warehouse workers continue to work without benefits or health insurance. Not to mention the use of staffing agencies that allow bosses to get away with blatant racial discrimination, violating worker safety laws, and widespread wage theft.

By shifting key full time positions to temp roles, workers are easier to dismiss and harder to organize. Temporary staffing agencies push down wages and working conditions while discriminating against workers, both in hiring and on the shop floor. 

With hefty construction costs of new development and an increase in real estate prices, the pressure will be on for corporations to keep labor costs low. This all but guarantees that temp agencies, with their promise of cheap labor and assumed liability, will continue to play a big role in staffing new warehouses.