North Dakota Growth Speakers Say Immigration Policy Could Limit Construction Industry

(Photo by Jeff Beach/North Dakota Monitor)

(North Dakota Monitor) – North Dakota is seeing some improvement in workforce availability, but the supply of skilled labor in the construction industry will likely remain tight with immigration policy a key factor, a top federal economy official says.

Neel Kashkari, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, said Thursday that a change in federal immigration policy in the last year is one of the factors limiting the availability of construction workers.

The Trump administration in September last year imposed a $100,000 fee for new H-1B visa petitions. Previously fees had ranged from $2,000 to $5,000.

“We know that immigrants have filled a lot of construction jobs, historically,” Kashkari told attendees of the Midwest Economic Outlook Summit in West Fargo. “This is a big policy change.”