The United States is facing a crucial workforce skills gap. For more rapid reshoring to take place, we need a more highly skilled and larger workforce. Availability of a skilled workforce is often the No. 1 criterion in factory site selection, retention and expansion. Recruiting that workforce also requires that reshoring be visibly successful so our youth see manufacturing as a stable career. Reshoring and skilled workforce go hand in hand—you simply can’t have one without the other.
According to a study by Deloitte and The Manufacturing Institute, 3.5 million manufacturing jobs will likely need to be filled over the next decade, but a skills gap is expected to leave 2 million of those jobs unfilled. Eighty-two percent of the manufacturers surveyed report that a shortage of workers with properly aligned skills adversely affects their ability to meet demand, and 78 percent say it hinders their ability to implement new technologies that increase productivity and competitiveness.