North Dakota wants immigrants, refugees to boost labor force

Katie Rolston Howe, director of workforce development for the North Dakota Department of Commerce, delivers remarks Aug. 21, 2024, during a Global Talent Summit at the Heritage Center that focused on workforce issues. (Michael Achterling/North Dakota Monitor)

North Dakota workforce needs and the capabilities of immigrant and refugee labor took center stage during the inaugural Global Talent Summit hosted by the state Office of Legal Immigration at the Heritage Center on Wednesday.

More than 13,000 job openings were posted online for the state in July, which Katie Rolston Howe, director of the workforce division for the Department of Commerce, said she believes immigrants and refugees can help fill some of the positions.

The Office of Legal Immigration, created by the North Dakota Legislature in 2023, has become a hub for information for employers and communities looking for resources to recruit immigrants, Rolston Howe said.

“We’re a great place to start, whether you’ve used immigration as a workforce guide in the past, or you are just looking to get started,” she said.

Tuesday’s event featured presentations to help employers connect with immigrant communities overseas and in the U.S. to draw more potential employees to the state.

Aswar Rahman, CEO of Victoria Street, a Twin Cities-based immigrant and refugee resettlement organization, said immigrant communities are aware of the political climate in the U.S. surrounding immigration and he tells them to think more locally instead of nationally.

“One of the phrases we share with everyone who comes is ‘at least in a place like Minnesota, and I’m going to say North Dakota, too, everybody wants you to succeed,’” Rahman said during the event. “Even the person who doesn’t like you would still want you to be successful, so who cares what they think. Instead, build the life you want.”

He also commended North Dakota’s messaging to communities outside the state as a wonderful place to live, raise a family and build a life.

“That’s what my people want,” he said.

During a panel discussion, Rebekah Smith, executive director for Washington, D.C.-based Labor and Mobility Partnerships, said she sees a “forever” labor shortage in developed countries that will not be able to keep up with the demand for workers unless it becomes easier to draw from the international labor market.

“There is not enough of any kind of worker,” Smith said. Previous labor shortages, she said, were grouped into types of workers, like engineers or agricultural workers, but that isn’t the case anymore. Labor shortages have become a threat to sustaining the U.S. economy, she said.

She added high-income countries are aging too quickly and not replacing their workforce due to a decreasing number of native-born births.

“We estimate by 2050, we’ll need 400 million new workers in high-income countries just to maintain the current structure of our economies. That’s not talking about growth, that’s not talking about innovation, that’s just to maintain our societies as they currently are,” Smith said.

Remote workers can alleviate some of the shortages, she said, but, especially in health care positions, it will take an actual person to fill that role, which is why immigrant labor and resettlement has become a valuable resource.

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