By Tim Henderson
Stateline

A perfect storm of harsh immigration enforcement, aging journeymen and a building boom for data centers is wreaking havoc on the nation’s supply of skilled trade workers. 

Automakers and construction contractors say they need more access to workers through accelerated training, steady immigration and a cultural shift to encourage young people to do the hard, dirty work of skilled trades. They’re looking for plumbers, electricians, carpenters, machinists and technicians — specializations increasingly in short supply. 

Worker shortages are the top reason for construction project delays, a September survey by the Association of General Contractors of America found. Applicants are there, but half of the contractors who were surveyed said too many job candidates are unqualified and need more training. 

The association cited both the demand for workers building data centers and tougher immigration enforcement as contributing causes for the shortage.  

“Over 50% of craft workers are born outside the United States. We don’t know that they’re illegal but frankly DHS (the Department of Homeland Security) is not being that discriminating in whom they pick up or who feels threatened by them,” said Ken Simonson, the chief economist for the Association of General Contractors of America. One answer is for the government to allow more worker visas for construction and other trades, he said. 

Pay is rising for the skilled trades, but it’s hard to say how soon higher wages would attract more people. On social media, trades workers complain of long commutes to work sites, long waits through low-paid apprenticeships and a feeling they’re not valued as much as office workers.

“Getting up at 4am-5am. Driving 50 plus miles to random job sites. Obviously the dirty part which is construction sites and inhaling dust and dirt all day. Seeing people in corporate jobs in nice clothes while I’m dirty going on lunch break,” wrote a 30-year-old on a Reddit social media post in July, concluding that they should have finished a college chemistry degree.

Thousands agreed, including a 31-year-old tradesperson from Michigan who said top pay in their field, plumbing and HVAC, is attractive but that many make less than $70,000. 

“Been in the trades since I was 16 and recently started going back to college,” the person wrote. “Everybody I know who chose a degree over an apprenticeship is starting to outpace me in life buying houses and having kids while we’re check to check and getting less healthy by the day. “

These are the concerns employers have to address if they’re going to find enough workers to build homes, cars and data centers for artificial intelligence. Ford Motor Company and the Ad Council announced a publicity campaign to bring more young people into the trades, with a video declaring “millions of skilled trade jobs are waiting for people ready to do something, with great pay, job security and work you can take pride in.” 

Ford and the alliance didn’t mention immigration enforcement as an issue, but the Association of General Contractors and an unrelated survey of roofers both mentioned it as a prominent factor in reducing the supply of skilled workers. 

John Burns Research and Consulting, an independent housing research company, reported that many of the roofers it surveyed earlier this year saw immigration enforcement as hurting their business. 

“There are no American kids willing to install roofs in Central Texas,” said one roofing contractor in anonymous quotes published by the group. 

“Tough immigration reform and not enough Americans to fill the void,” said another. 

“A lot of these people have been deported. The next generation is complacent and does not want to do physical work,” said a Florida roofer. 

Elizabeth LaJeunesse, vice president of building products research at John Burns, said the vehemence of responses about immigration was surprising. 

“Most of these firms are pretty conservative, so this is a real phenomenon we’re picking up on, that level of concern over immigration enforcement,” LaJeunesse said.

Duane Musser, vice president for government relations for the National Roofing Contractors Association, said the responses are typical of what he hears from members. Immigration as well as better trade education are critical to roofing, he said. 

“Advocating for solutions to workforce shortages, including expanded career and technical education programs and bipartisan immigration reform, is a top priority,” Musser said. 

The DHS told Stateline in an unattributed statement that “those who are here legally and are not breaking other laws have nothing to fear” and that “we will continue to enforce our nation’s laws and remove illegal aliens from American communities.” 

In September a Trump-appointed federal judge stayed a federal practice of entering construction sites without a warrant to investigate immigration status. One construction worker of Mexican descent in Alabama complained that he had been detained three times since 2025 despite showing a state driver’s license demonstrating that he was a citizen born in Florida. 

Immigrant workers make up a majority of roofers, painters and stucco masons, according to a Stateline analysis last year.  

The nation will need 1.7 million new skilled trade workers every year through 2035, according to a September report by Alliance for America’s Skilled Trades, a trade group including Ford Motor Company, toolmakers and other businesses. Training programs produce just more than half the numbers needed, and only half of those who enroll in skilled training programs finish, the report found.  

Nine states were identified by the alliance report as having high demand but low supply of skilled labor: Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas. 

Florida ranks first for demand for skilled workers, but nearly last for supply, higher only than Maine. Not enough new Florida workers are coming online as building in the state booms and current workers near retirement age. The state’s Association of General Contractors’ chapter hopes the advancements in workforce AI will drive more young adults into construction jobs since those can’t be replaced by chatbots.

Other states have the opposite issue: ranking high for new workers but low in demand for them, based on recent hiring and future projections. 

In the top 10 for worker supply but bottom 10 for demand: Indiana, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Wyoming. 

The alliance report suggested employers themselves need to help train future workers. The companies building data centers, in particular, want those tradespeople.

“America needs hundreds of thousands of electricians, welders and fiber technicians to build AI infrastructure,” said Dina Powell McCormick, president and vice chairman of Meta, in a statement, adding that the alliance is “paying for the training, removing the barriers that keep people from stepping into these careers, and guaranteeing a job at the end of it.”

Shoua Thao, 40,  is straddling the line between trades and AI as a machinist in the computer-assisted manufacturing business known as CNC machining, which uses computer code to control production. The son of Hmong refugees in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota, Thao is now experimenting with AI production techniques. 

“Trades are the one career path that doesn’t lie,” he said. “You can’t hide lower skills in a trade, whereas middle management and white collar jobs are protected by the vagueness of the job.”

Eventually trades could become a more valued career path than college, Thao said, though he has been discouraged at times by low pay and long hours that take time away from family.

“I think it will be a slow process but eventually, sometime in the future, maybe my children’s future, trades will take over,” Thao said. 

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.