Two recent posts have discussed the U.S. need for more immigrants in agriculture and business.[1]
This point was underscored by a New York Times article focusing on the need for more immigrants in the construction industry.[2]
This article states, “Nationwide, the average wage of nonsupervisory workers in residential construction hit $25.34 an hour in January. That’s over 6 percent more than a year earlier, close to the steepest annual increase since the government started keeping track almost 30 years ago. Pay is taking off even among those in less-skilled construction trades.”
This “rising cost of . . . [construction] crews reflects a demographic reality that could hamstring industries besides their own: Their labor force is shrinking. President Trump’s threat to close the Mexican border, a move that would cause damage to both economies, only adds to the pressure.”
In addition, “economic growth in Mexico and the aging of . . . [its] population were reducing the flow of Mexican workers into the United States. The number of undocumented immigrants in America declined to 10.7 million at the end of 2017 from a peak of over 12 million at the height of the housing bubble in 2008, according to the Center for Migration Studies.” This is coupled with projections of “very little growth in the[U.S.] working-age population over the next two decades. If the United States were to cut off the flow of new immigrants, Pew noted, its working population would shrink to 166 million in 2035 from 173 million in 2015.”
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[1] “America’s Farms Need Immigrants,” dwkcommentaries.com (Mar. 22, 2019); Businesses Need More Immigrants, dwkcommentaries.com (Mar. 24, 2019).
[2] Porter, Short of Workers, U.S. Builders and Farmers Crave More Immigrants, N.Y. Times (April 3, 2019).