Milwaukeeruns on a handful of strong industries. If you’re job-hunting or weighing a move, here’s where the opportunities (and the big-name employers) are.
Top industries & employers
Insurance & financial services
Northwestern Mutual, Fiserv, Robert W. Baird, Artisan Partners, American Family's Milwaukee operations, West Bend Insurance
Northwestern Mutual's downtown tower is the city's defining corporate presence and it is one of the largest life insurers in the United States. Fiserv, one of the biggest payments processors in the world, is headquartered in the metro. Together with Baird this is a genuinely deep financial-services job market for a city of this size.
Industrial technology & automation
Rockwell Automation, Johnson Controls, Komatsu Mining, Milwaukee Tool, Harley-Davidson, Briggs & Stratton legacy, Regal Rexnord
Rockwell Automation is headquartered here and the region markets itself as an industrial-automation cluster with real justification — this is one of the densest concentrations of controls, power transmission and heavy equipment engineering in America. Harley-Davidson has built motorcycles in Milwaukee since 1903 and the museum is downtown.
Health care & medical research
Advocate Aurora Health, Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, Children's Wisconsin, Ascension Wisconsin, GE HealthCare in Waukesha
Children's Wisconsin is among the leading paediatric hospitals in the country and a genuine reason families choose this metro. GE HealthCare's global imaging business is headquartered just west of the city in Waukesha, which makes medical imaging an unexpectedly deep local engineering speciality.
Water technology & freshwater science
The Water Council and the Global Water Center, A.O. Smith, Badger Meter, Zurn Elkay, Veolia's Milwaukee operations, UW-Milwaukee's School of Freshwater Sciences
Milwaukee has deliberately built itself into a global water technology cluster, and the claim is better founded than most civic branding: UW-Milwaukee runs the only graduate school of freshwater sciences in the United States, and the Global Water Center in Walker's Point houses water startups, established manufacturers and research in one building on the harbour.
Food, beverage & consumer
Molson Coors, Kohl's in Menomonee Falls, Sargento, Palermo's, Colectivo Coffee, Lakefront and a large independent brewing sector
Milwaukee's brewing history is not just heritage — Molson Coors still operates the Miller Valley brewery in the city, and the independent brewing and coffee-roasting sector is dense. Kohl's, one of the largest US department store chains, is headquartered in the north-western suburbs.
Higher education & the public sector
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Marquette University, the Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Area Technical College, Milwaukee County, the City of Milwaukee
UW-Milwaukee and Marquette between them are a large stable employment base, and Marquette's law and engineering schools feed directly into the local professional market. Milwaukee County's government is unusually large because it runs the transit system, the parks and the behavioural health division.
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