MULTIHOUSING PRO: …”Many skilled workers migrated to the oil and gas industries and have been slow to return, in part out of fear of another downturn and, also, due to higher wages paid in the oil and gas industries, even though wages in our industry have escalated rapidly,” said Scott Wise, Greystar executive managing director of development.
Immigrant labor also is in shorter supply today. “A lot of those folks who had been here for 15 or 20 years, sending money back to their country to support others, got up and went (when construction came to a standstill) and they haven’t come back and our immigration laws are making it tougher to cross the border,” he said…
According to Crone, the average age of a carpenter is 49; welder, 55; plumber, 56; and stonemason, 69 and, in five years, 20 percent of skilled laborers in the industry will have retired, with few trained workers to take their place… (more)
EDITOR: Serious thought should be given to allowing free passage among Canada, USA and Mexico as exists within the European Union. Given our aging population, we need younger workers to perform construction and other blue-color jobs and to pay taxes into Social Security.
One would hope that these types of professions would be part of the educational training required as part of the reduction in welfare and expired unemployment compensation.
What would have helped would the construction trades training people and also taking safety standards seriously instead of hiring illegals to build without adhering to codes or safety rules.
Yes, construction would be more expensive but we would have skilled, safe domestic workers and good buildings instead of the slop that was thrown up during the 90s housing construction boom.