Fig. 4: Vehicle production, workforce size, and labor intensity in Oakland County, Michigan.

a Oakland County, Michigan, is home to the Orion Township assembly plant owned and operated by General Motors (GM). Before the 2008 recession, plants in the cities of Pontiac and Wixom were also actively producing vehicles, but both plants shut down in 2010, leaving the Orion plant as the sole operating plant in the county. In 2016, Orion began producing the Chevy Bolt BEV alongside GM ICEVs, before exclusively producing the Bolt as of 2021. The green shaded areas indicate BEV production. The gray shaded areas indicate ICEV production. b Annual vehicle production volumes. c Employment numbers, sourced by averaging two government NAICS 3361 datasets: the U.S. Quarterly Workforce Indicators (QWI) and the U.S. Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW). d Labor intensity in Oakland compared to the U.S. average. Labor intensity is measured in workers needed to produce 1,000 vehicles per annum (WPV). ICEV: internal combustion engine vehicle. BEV: battery electric vehicle. NAICS: North American Industry Classification System. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.