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Muse Spark 1.2Oct 9, 2026meta/muse-spark-1.2-20260805

Will stopping immigration cause labor shortages?

Stopping immigration could shift labor markets — I'll review what research says about shortages.

Short answer: Yes, according to most economic research, stopping immigration entirely or sharply reducing it would very likely cause or worsen labor shortages, especially in the short-to-medium term and in specific industries, though the magnitude and economy-wide effect is debated.

1. Why economists predict shortages if immigration stops

A. Immigrants are a large share of the workforce

In 2023, immigrants constituted 18.6% of the U.S. civilian labor force, filling critical roles in industries with unmet demands.

Nationally, 30 percent of construction workers are foreign born, and about 70% of farm workers are immigrants.

Analysis estimates roughly 12.6 million undocumented immigrants live in the U.S., with about 9 million working, mostly in low-skilled jobs.

B. Immediate labor force contraction

A sudden plunge in immigration reduces the labor force available to fill jobs that businesses expect to fill, which Brookings models say will dampen employment, GDP, and consumer spending.

Recent analyses project:

•A 6.8 million reduction in the workforce by 2028 and 15.7 million by 2035 could hit just as retirements accelerate
•"The Trump administration's policies on illegal and legal immigration would reduce the projected number of workers in the United States by 6.8 million by 2028 and by 15.7 million by 2035"

The Congressional Budget Office has similarly stated: “The reduction in net migration slows the growth of the labor force and puts downward pressure on the CBO's projections”, projecting average annual labor-force growth of just 0.4 percent between 2026 and 2029 compared with 1.6 percent during the four years following the pandemic.

C. Tightened immigration controls already linked to shortages

> Tightened immigration controls are directly linked to growing labor shortages in key sectors of the U.S. economy

> Labor shortages are growing in sectors that rely heavily on immigrant workers, including agriculture, construction, food service, healthcare, and transportation

More detail:

Sectors affected: Agriculture: Fewer workers for planting and harvesting, Construction: Delays and higher costs, Food service, Healthcare, Transportation

The U.S. Department of Labor itself said in an Oct. 2 filing in the Federal Register: "The near total cessation of the inflow of illegal aliens combined with the lack of an available legal workforce,'' ... "results in significant disruptions to production costs and (threatens) the stability of domestic food production and prices for U.S consumers.''

A 2025 Brookings study of ICE enforcement surges found the enforcement surge cost 668,000 jobs. Across the cities with the sharpest rise in ICE arrests, employment fell 0.73% below what they would have seen absent the surge, and that Job losses far exceeded the number of people arrested. Losses concentrated in immigrant-intensive sectors but spread well beyond them.

2. Demographic reason shortages would worsen without immigration

The U.S. faces an aging population and low birth rates.

•Even with immigration levels matching the 2010–2019 decade, working-age population growth would hit a historically low 550,000 annually due to aging demographics and flat birth rates from 20 years ago.
•The United States needs net immigration of at least 280,000 per year through 2028 to prevent declines in the working-age population.
•Without immigration, the U.S. workforce would decline from 173 million in 2015 to just 166 million in 2035.
•The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco found that without immigration, the U.S. working-age population would have started shrinking in 2012, not 2025.
•Working-age population growth averaged 2 million annually from 1971–2010, then decelerated as baby boomers retired... sharp immigration curtailment in 2024–2025 plus continued retirements drive working-age population growth to near-1970 lows, risking future labor shortages.

In that context, immigrants will make up the majority of working-age population growth, increasing by 17.6 million new immigrants by 2035 resulting in a working age population of 183 million.

Pew Research similarly projects 17.6 million new immigrants will be added to the working-age population by 2035, offsetting the aging or death of other working-age immigrants. Without them, the total U.S. working-age population would drop by almost 8 million.

3. Counter-arguments: Why some say shortages would be limited or manageable

Not all economists expect catastrophic nationwide shortages:

> Broadly speaking, economists say they don't anticipate widespread economic reverberations including labor shortages... "This is out of a labor force of nearly 170 million people," said Daniel Di Martino, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

Arguments against the shortage thesis include:

1.Wage and participation effects: Tighter labor supply could raise wages, drawing more native-born workers, discouraged workers, retirees, or part-time workers back into the labor force. Some argue this would reduce unemployment for native workers, though research shows enforcement reduced construction employment for American-born workers as firms scaled back.
2.Automation and productivity: Telehealth and AI diagnostics may offset labor shortages in the long term. More broadly, automation, robotics, and now artificial intelligence are increasingly seen as the primary solution to labor shortages.
3.Small net wage effects: The 2016 National Academies report found very small long-run wage effects on native workers overall, and little evidence of significant effects on native employment, suggesting immigrants often fill jobs native-born workers won't or complement rather than replace native workers. One model incorporates complementarities between native and immigrant workers together with a Leontief-type production technology that generates labor shortages... immigration alleviates these shortages by helping fill vacancies and dampening wage growth.
4.Demand also falls: The CBO and other analysts note that fewer immigrants also means fewer consumers. Economists wrote that they expect negative immigration to have little impact on prices and inflation because businesses will experience reductions in both labor supply and demand for their goods and services.

4. Bottom line

•If immigration were stopped completely: Virtually all labor market projections show the working-age population would shrink, and sectors heavily dependent on foreign-born labor - agriculture, construction, hospitality, health care, and logistics - would face acute, immediate shortages, with higher costs, project delays, and slower GDP growth.
•If immigration were merely reduced significantly: Shortages would likely deepen relative to baseline, but could be partially mitigated over years by higher wages, increased labor force participation, internal migration, and automation.
•Long-term: Due to demographics - 3.6 million U.S.-born residents turning 20 versus 3.3 million turning 65—a net difference of just 300,000 - maintaining labor force growth without immigration is mathematically very difficult.

Most Federal Reserve, CBO, and academic models conclude immigration has helped ease labor shortages and moderated wage growth in recent years, and reversing that flow would tighten labor markets again.

Citations (3)

  1. 1pwc.comCompanies
    Demographic shifts and housing market impacts: PwC

    Backs: “In 2023, immigrants constituted 18.6% of the U.S. civilian labor force, filling critical roles in industries with unmet demands.”

  2. 2visaverge.comCommercial content
    Will US Immigration Restrictions Lead to a Shrinking Workforce?

    Backs: “Nationally, 30 percent of construction workers are foreign born, and about 70% of farm workers are immigrants. Analysis estimates roughly 12.6 million undocumented immigrants live in the U.S., with about 9 million working, mostly in low-skilled jobs.”

  3. 3brookings.eduNonprofits and think tanks
    Shock, awe, and economic fallout

    Backs: “"results in significant disruptions to production costs and (threatens) the stability of domestic food production and prices for U.S consumers.''. A 2025 Brookings study of ICE enforcement surges found the enforcement surge cost 668,000 jobs. Across the cities with the sharpest rise in ICE arrests, employment fell…”