The United States is losing skilled workers, and fast. More than 71 percent of employers are considering relocating workers currently in the United States because of immigration restrictions. Tens of thousands of workers trained in U.S. colleges and universities left for Canada between 2017 and 2021.
Despite economic uncertainty, the U.S. continues to face critical labor shortages, with over 10 million job openings and only 5.7 million unemployed workers. As the U.S. Chamber of Commerce reported: "If every unemployed worker took an open job in their industry, there would still be millions of open jobs." These vacancies especially threaten the survival of rural communities.
Current U.S. policy also overlooks another potential talent pool: refugees. As indicated by more than 60,000 refugees who have registered their professional background in a database called the Talent Catalog, many refugees have the experience and qualifications to work in industries like education and health services, skilled trades, and IT. Talent Beyond Boundaries, where I serve as U.S. director, has supported hundreds of these refugees to fill critical roles with dozens of companies in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Promoting refugees' access to employment-based visas would advance the administration's stated priorities. President Joe Biden's proposed budget prioritizes funding to "support programs aimed at improving the lives of migrants and refugees in the Western Hemisphere" and "enhance legal pathways and protection in the hemisphere." This proposal echoes the Los Angeles Declaration, which the White House championed, and the State Department's Resettlement Diplomacy Network. These initiatives urge governments to expand safe and legal pathways for refugees, including labor mobility.
But the administration's steps to expand access to employment pathways for people with protection needs have been limited. So far, the administration has made more short-term and low-wage visas available, allocating 6,500 H-2B visas to nationals of Haiti, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.
Short-term visas like H-2As and H-2Bs do not provide accessible pathways for refugees because these visas require an individual to prove that they intend to return to their country of origin. More broadly, refugees often cannot obtain or renew passports, or can do so only at great personal risk. Many times, displaced individuals have only secondary documents to prove their education or experience.
The Biden administration should ensure that displaced people can live and work in the United States long-term. This is a unique opportunity for the administration to advance a win-win solution. On one hand, expanding visa access allows a refugee family to relocate to the United States to rebuild their careers and their lives. On the other, it also supports U.S. employers, who need more workers across a wide range of occupations and wage levels—not just in the roles that H-2B workers traditionally fill.
Failing to accommodate refugees for higher-wage employment opportunities reflects the troubling and inaccurate view that refugees can only fill low-wage roles. The failure to act is further puzzling in light of the significant labor shortages that U.S. companies face.
The administration has the authority to address these barriers. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the State Department should publish guidance instructing their officials to accept alternative forms of evidence of refugees' background, education, and work history, as U.S. immigration law already allows. The State Department should offer more flexibility in requirements to have a current passport for displaced people who cannot obtain one. The State Department should also allow displaced people to attend visa interviews at secure facilities connected to consulates via secure teleconferencing systems.
USCIS and the State Department should also address the challenges common across the U.S. immigration system, including long processing times and interview backlogs. Critically, the Department of Labor should revise and expand Schedule A, its list of occupations facing worker shortages. All of these changes can be made without legislation.
These simple reforms would advance U.S. goals of promoting safe and legal pathways for migration, benefit U.S. employers facing labor shortages amid immigration barriers, and allow displaced people to rebuild their lives and contribute to new communities.
Betsy Fisher is the U.S. director of Talent Beyond Boundaries.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
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