06/02/2026
The workers are ready. Are the owners and developers?
NABTU is setting the record straight: America's construction workforce gaps aren't inevitable; they're the result of choices. Decades of prioritizing cheap, short-term labor over real workforce investment created the problem. The solution already exists: tuition-free Registered Apprenticeship Programs, Earn While You Learn training and a pipeline of over 300,000 skilled craft workers ready to build the data centers, energy infrastructure and manufacturing facilities driving our economy forward.
Projects using union labor are 40 percent less likely to experience skilled labor shortages. The path forward is partnership and long-term planning, not panic.
https://nabtu.org/press_releases/the-u-s-does-not-have-a-skilled-craft-labor-shortage-it-has-a-workforce-planning-crisis/