The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported earlier this year that there were 11.2 million job openings and six million people unemployed. Even if all the unemployed were a good match for the openings, that’s still a huge labor shortage. Businesses of all sizes are struggling to find sufficient employees to keep businesses open and running.

The current worker shortage can be partly attributed to the decline in foreign workers entering the United States. Census Bureau data show that the U.S. population increased from immigration by over one million in 2015-2016 but only by 247,000 in 2020-2021. This is a sharp decline that can be attributed to the pandemic, the closing of the southern border, and the closure of U.S. consulates abroad.