Nebraska needs immigrants • Nebraska Examiner

Nebraska emerged from the pandemic in 2022 with the worst workforce shortage in the U.S.

Businesses and governments statewide had more than 80,000 job openings and only 32 people looking for work for every 100 of those openings, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Unfortunately, according to the same dataset, Nebraska and Utah currently have the lowest available worker ratio to job openings in the U.S. Only 56 Nebraskans are looking for work for every 100 job openings, while the national average is 84 people looking for work for every 100 openings.

This is not a short-term problem. In 2022, there were 2,000 fewer Nebraska students enrolled in kindergarten than in the 12th grade, according to Nebraska Public Schools data.

A possible solution

Business and trade association leaders say: “Immigrants are the solution!”

Omaha Together One Community (OTOC) leaders conducted more than 100 meetings over the past three years with Nebraska agricultural, health-care, labor, education, hospitality, philanthropic, faith, construction, immigrant, legal, banking, and community leaders to learn more about our workforce needs.

We learned that an owner of a dairy farm had been awake for almost 48 hours milking his cows because his short-term immigrant staff had to leave Nebraska when their work visas expired. We heard of immigrants with work visas who can come to the U.S. with their families, but their spouses and working-age children are not allowed to work.

We learned of Nebraskans who travel 90 miles each way to see an elderly grandmother because their local long-term care facility is closed due to an inability to hire adequate staff.

We also heard of community leaders who were concerned that their schools and churches were at risk of closing. They no longer had pharmacies, hardware stores and car repair shops. They were at risk of losing their grocery stores and coffee
shops. They said loud and clear: “We don’t need immigrant workers! We need immigrant families!”

A new alliance

As result of these meetings, a statewide non-partisan alliance has formed. The Nebraska Alliance for Thriving Communities includes leaders from across the state. This 70-member Alliance agrees on a common-sense set of immigration priorities to enrich our communities and address Nebraska’s
workforce shortage.

According to a recent study funded by the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce Foundation, “There is universal and widespread business support for immigration reform as a means to address the workforce gap in Nebraska. Participants clearly understood that the demand generated from the state’s current economic growth trajectory will exceed the state’s projected workforce supply. Nebraska’s decreasing birth rate coupled with a high labor force participation rate will require a talent influx in order to meet the needs of the state’s strong projected economic growth. There was universal consensus that immigration is critical to the state’s ability to continue to grow and prosper.”

Omaha Together One Community agrees! Nebraska needs more immigrants, not less!

Kathleen Grant is a leader of Omaha Together One Community Omaha Together One Community, a 30-year-old organization of 30 church congregations and community organizations that trains leaders to work across barriers for the common good.