People assume agriculture fuels the Midwest’s fortunes, but manufacturing plays a key role, too.
The latter is the largest industry in Iowa, making up 17 percent of the state’s GDP. “We added 16,000 manufacturing jobs in 2014,” says Tina Hoffman, marketing and communications director at the state’s Economic Development Authority in Des Moines. As with agriculture, the market “has been contracting a bit” in the past two years, she notes. Nonetheless, building companies account for about 10 percent of Iowa’s 216,167 manufacturing jobs.
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