This article was originally published in the Washington Post on August 22, 2023.
The Aug. 11 editorial “The U.S. economy is running short on a key ingredient” suggested that meeting the needs of American industrial growth will require workforce supplementation, including through immigration. Though creating a visa to retain critical graduates is ideal, it requires improbable congressional action.
Even without Congress, President Biden can help attract skilled workers, retain the existing workforce and decrease the time American businesses wait for relief — by updating Schedule A.
Schedule A is a list of occupations that the Labor Department acknowledges need more workers and that immigrants could fill without harming U.S. employees. Employers unable to find Americans to fill these jobs benefit from reduced procedural immigration requirements by relying on existing Labor Department analysis to demonstrate the extent of their labor needs. But because the list has not been updated in more than 30 years, it does not reflect the current labor market.