What do you say to this, Glenn and Joe? It IS obvious that we don’t have enough workers, just look at the unemployment rate. Skilled workers are an especially sector that is problematical.Eddie Martin can’t build as many homes as he’d like in Texas because his contractors don’t have enough workers, particularly skilled tradespeople such as electricians, carpenters and plumbers.
This labor shortage, exacerbated by an aging workforce and growing number of retirements, means it’s more crucial than ever for the US to allow more legal immigrants into the country to bolster the ranks of the construction industry, said Martin, CEO of Tilson Custom Home Builders in Austin.
“We’re losing business. There’s no doubt,” said Martin, whose wife’s family started the company in 1932. “So many of those skilled workers are aging out. There’s nobody replacing them.”
Martin works with 300 contractors to build homes for teachers, police officers, firefighters and others in the middle class, with 500 units currently in the pipeline. But he now has to tell would-be clients that it will likely take 14 months to complete the job, instead of nine months, which prompts some of them to walk away. If the contractors could boost their workforces by a third, Tilson says he could probably build another 175 homes a year.
Martin, along with many others in the residential and commercial construction industries, have been pushing Congress for years to create a new work visa program or expand existing ones, such as the H-2B program, to enable them to hire more immigrants. Some would also like to accelerate work authorizations of asylum seekers so they can start training sooner instead of having to wait 180 days, as required by federal law.
The need is growing as the demand for housing increases and as federal infrastructure funding is injected into communities across the country — at a time when fewer young Americans are choosing construction as a career. President Joe Biden has recently pushed several initiatives to lower housing costs and increase supply, including at a campaign stop in Nevada on Tuesday.
But the toxic politics surrounding the border is currently seizing up the passage of new immigration legislation in Congress, quashing any hope of allowing more documented immigrants to build homes, apartment buildings, retail developments and infrastructure projects anytime soon.
Yet you guys want to KEEP everyone from coming in.
I say the problem is two-fold, and building a wall doesn’t cut it.
First, we need training for American kids. Decades ago, our politicians decided against vocational training vs. college. When I went to school, scads of my classmates went to Vo-Tech. Now it’s not really available.
First, bring it back. Second, raise the wages for skilled workers.
Third, we need workers, period, so we need to reform our immigration to allow easier legal immigration and guest worker programs, especially for skilled workers. And stop demonizing people that want to come here to work.
They right doesn’t like this idea, because they WANT the workers - after all, nearly a tenth of Texas employees are undocumented, and the Governor and legislature of the state seems to be fine with it, as they aren’t cracking down on employers at all. They just like to keep them illegal, so that the workers can’t demand rights or even a minimum wage. Doing it this way drives ALL worker wages down, and that’s the point, isn’t it?
We need to look at the problems of our nation realistically, to solve them. We don’t need racism and demonization of people just to score political points.
