Provide Input on List of In-Demand Positions for Employment-Based Immigration

In today's email, I've highlighted a career fair, career expo, and an opportunity to provide input on in-demand positions as they relate to the immigration process.

Minnesota State University, Mankato - Disability Career Fair - March 13

Next Wednesday, March 13 from 11am-1pm, Minnesota State University, Mankato is hosting a career fair specifically targeted at students with disabilities. If your organization is looking to diversify your workforce while hiring students with physical or mental disabilities you can register for this career fair for free.

More information and an employer registration link can be found here or you can contact Alexis Persons at [email protected]. Registration is required by the end of the day today, March 8. (Sorry for the late notice on this - better late than never?)

New Ulm Chamber of Commerce Career Expo

One week prior to the Greater Mankato Career Expo, the New Ulm Area Chamber of Commerce will be hosting their own expo for area 8th and 10th grade students.

During this event, approximately 400-500 students will engage with your employees and interactive activities that highlight careers within your industry or business. Exhibitors answer questions about education, necessary skills, wages, and opportunities within their own industry. Career exploration events are significant, because they introduce your future workforce to careers before they enter the workforce, college, or other training programs. Businesses register via this link: Career Expo - Mar 27, 2024 (newulm.com)

For questions, contact Skyler Carlson with Junior Achievement North at [email protected]?

?Why and How to Expand US Immigration

"For most would-be immigrants without relatives in the United States or a college degree, there is no line; legal immigration to the United States is a functional impossibility." (Quoted in the article referenced below).

The Minnesota Chamber of Commerce was the first State chamber to call for comprehensive immigration reform as a workforce strategy. Similarly, in Greater Mankato Growth's 2024 policy priorities we state that "Reforms should be made to our federal immigration system so that employers can meet their workforce needs in a timely manner for both permanent & temporary workers."

This begs the question of what might comprehensive immigration reform look like.

?This article by The Aspen Institute , Why and How to Expand US Immigration (PDF Download), provides a potential answer to this question. The 20 page article is worth a read, but I'll summarize my key takewaways below.

• The United States places a large emphasis on family-based immigration in comparison with most other countries. Family-based immigration offers some benefits; however, it does not produce migration patterns that are best aligned with the labor market needs. The article offers that more emphasis should be based on employment based immigration.
• Employment based sponsorship can be onerous on an employer due to requirements to prove that they cannot find a domestic worker for those roles coupled with per-country limits on individuals who can be sponsored. ("There are more than 700,000 Indian would-be immigrants who have secured employer sponsorship...fewer than 10,000 can be granted permanent residence each year. There is little economic rationale for turning away global talent at this scale.")
• A partial solution to this already exists. Schedule A is a list of occupational shortages identified by the Department of Labor that can expedite the process of showing that a job cannot be filled by a domestic employee. That list, which currently only includes nursing and physical therapy, has not been updated since 1991.
• Only 10,000 employment green cards can be granted each year to workers in positions that require less than two years of experience or training. These positions are in high demand and this limit could be expanded and these positions could be listed in Schedule A.

The article spends additional attention on other elements of immigration including bureaucracy, the impact of immigration on individuals and communities, and a suggested timeline for making these changes, but I wanted to highlight some of those employment based takeaways mentioned above.

The Department of Labor (DOL) is Currently Seeking Input on Schedule A.

It was fortuitous that as I read the article listed above, Region Nine Development Commission shared a Department of Labor RFI (Request for Information) with me as the Department of Labor seeks to explore expanding schedule A to include STEM and other non-STEM occupations that are experiencing labor shortages. The RFI did not receive enough high quality responses to assist decision-making so the response deadline was extended until May 14.

?Federal Register Listing: Federal Register :: Labor Certification for Permanent Employment of Foreign Workers in the United States; Modernizing Schedule A To Include Consideration of Additional Occupations in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and Non-STEM Occupations

?Regulations.gov page for submitting comments: Regulations.gov

?Best,

Ryan