In 1922, the Bethlehem Steel Company acquired the Lackawanna Steel Company. With the 20th-century growth of the Bethlehem Steel plant, at one time the largest in the world, came the continued growth of the city and its institutions. At its peak, the plant employed 20,000 people. It attracted immigrants from many lands to settle and make their homes. Due to industrial restructuring in the latter half of the 20th century and arbitrary property tax assessment increases levied on the plant by the town, the steel plant declined in business and eventually closed in 1983, following massive job layoffs.