By Ethan Gibble
Contributing Writer
In July, the number of job openings in the United States fell to 8.8 million — the lowest level since March 2021. It was a positive sign for businesses that have long been struggling to find workers, but the number of openings still remains nearly 1 million above pre-pandemic levels. Further, the number of unemployed people for each job opening stood at 0.7 in July, meaning the volume of potential candidates is too shallow to fill the pool in most industries. The wholesale trade category, which includes most equipment distributors, had 237,000 openings in the last Job Openings and Labor Turnover (JOLT) report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Meanwhile, the manufacturing industry is so starved for workers that even if every unemployed person with durable goods manufacturing experience were employed, only about 75 percent of open jobs could be filled.
A variety of factors such as early retirement, lack of access to childcare and newly created businesses have fueled the nation’s labor shortage. With those factors unlikely to change, businesses are looking for other labor spigots to turn. With its Legal Immigration and Border Enforcement Reform This Year (LIBERTY) Campaign, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is taking aim at another significant contributor: America’s broken immigration system.
Playing the Hand That’s Dealt
The U.S. Chamber has had success advocating for immigration-related measures over the past two years. Notable achievements include securing relief from caps on H-2B visas, which allow temporary non-agricultural workers to enter the country, and reauthorization of the EB-5 Regional Center Program, which creates a path to permanent residency for individuals who make significant investments into the United States. But at the end of 2022, with a slim Senate majority for the Democratic party and a slim House majority for the Republican party on the horizon, it was clear that there were significant hurdles standing in the way of making greater progress on overhauling the country’s immigration laws.
“We weren’t going to get the types of big, broad changes to immigration reform that would have a really meaningful impact across a host of industries,” said Jon Baselice, vice president of immigration policy for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. With an eye on making attainable progress, the LIBERTY Campaign is calling for three key things — more border resources, reformation of the asylum system and modernizing the employment verification process.
Accomplishing those goals requires a flexible strategy. Baselice noted that some legislators want to enact large bills dealing with all these problems at once, while others prefer a more piecemeal approach. “For the Chamber and a lot of the business groups that are part of the LIBERTY Campaign, we’ll take whatever we can get. What encourages me about the outreach we’ve had with Capitol Hill is that so many offices, whether you’re dealing with folks on the left side of the political spectrum or the right, recognize that these problems aren’t going to fix themselves. They’re hearing quite a bit from their constituents at home about how businesses simply cannot find enough workers. That is a lot different from the last time that I was on Capitol Hill trying to do this. When we launched S.744 back in 2013, unemployment was hovering around 8 percent. Now it’s at 3.5 percent. That changes things.”
Bipartisanship
As part of its LIBERTY Campaign, the U.S. Chamber sent a letter to Congress in support of 15 bipartisan bills that would help address the nation’s immigration challenges. Baselice highlighted a few of the bills that he feels have a real chance of passing and making a humanitarian impact while alleviating labor challenges.
The Afghan Adjustment Act, for example, would create a path to permanent residential status for tens of thousands of Afghans who came to America after the Taliban took control of Kabul. “That’s something you might not associate as being a high priority for businesses, but we need these people,” Baselice said. “These are individuals who fought with our men and women in uniform for 20 years. We’ve got to have something for them.”
As another example, there are hundreds of thousands of children and young adults living in the United States as dependents of employment-based visa holders. These folks can stay a dependent until they turn 21, at which point they either need to obtain another status or return to their country of birth. The Protecting Children of Long-Term Visa Holders Act would permanently protect these children from deportation so they may continue contributing to America’s communities and employers. “These are people who grew up here, went to school here, maybe played sports with your kids or your nieces and nephews,” Baselice said. “That’s another one where there’s a significant amount of bipartisan agreement.”
Lastly, the Eliminating Backlogs Act seeks to recapture unused employment-based immigrant visas from the past 30 years and exempt them from the existing 7 percent per-country limit. Due to bureaucratic delays and slow processing, the employment-based green card backlog currently stands at more than 1 million people.
“The process hasn’t been updated in any meaningful way since the 140,000 employment-based immigrant limit was established in 1990,” Baselice explains. “GDP in 1990 was 9.37 trillion. In 2022 it was 20 trillion. The immigration system is stuck in the past, but by recapturing all those unused visas, you’re creating this very significant one-time shot in the arm where you’re going to be able to cut through a significant amount of the backlog.”
One Step at a Time
Baselice not only encourages companies to implore their business associations to join the LIBERTY Campaign, but to also let their member of Congress know how inextricably linked the vast shortcomings of our immigration system are to today’s workforce challenges.
“Look at what other countries are doing,” he said. “Germany is looking to pass legislation that would change its immigration laws to become more welcoming. The U.K. is revisiting its shortage occupation list and the Australians are doing a similar thing. The Canadians have a parliamentary system where they can make all sorts of adjustments to their immigration system, but most recently they basically tried to poach H-1B workers from the United States. All these countries are looking at using their immigration system to help their nation compete in the global economy. In the United States, we’re largely just arguing with each other about what to do.”
Passing any of these smaller, targeted immigration bills could be the gateway to even more sweeping, impactful change. “If we can pass just one of these bills and get it signed into law, that can be a confidence builder for Congress,” Baselice explained. “All of a sudden, something is across the finish line. No one suffered any negative electoral consequences because of it. Now, let’s do more.