Careers & Skills
A new industry-backed report projects that the United States will need to fill about 1.7 million skilled-trades openings each year through 2035, as occupations grow and workers retire or change jobs. “The State of America’s Skilled Trades: A National Report,” published September 30 by the Alliance for America’s Skilled Trades, also says training programs are producing about 55 workers for every 100 needed. It identifies Georgia as one of nine states where demand outpaces supply.
The figures need careful reading. Annual openings include replacement needs, not just new jobs, and the report comes from a coalition of employers with a direct interest in expanding the trades workforce. The Alliance was founded in July by BlackRock, Carhartt, Ford and Google; its members include Meta, Microsoft, NVIDIA, AT&T and Verizon. The analysis was prepared by the Burning Glass Institute.
A completion problem
The report covers 124 skilled-trades occupations across all 50 states. It says only about half of people who enroll in skilled-trades training finish, while high-quality apprenticeship programs can have completion rates above 90%. It points to practical barriers, including transportation, childcare and the need for a paycheck while training. That shifts the question from how many people enroll to how many finish a pathway employers recognize, a theme in the federal apprenticeship data jobgetr.ai has reported on.
Georgia is a gap state
The report lists Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas as states where skilled-trades demand exceeds supply. It does not publish a Georgia-specific openings or shortage count in the summary material, and the finding is statewide, not an estimate for metro Atlanta. Local demand varies by occupation, project pipeline and licensing rules.
Workers considering a trade should look past the national headline to the actual local pathway for the occupation: apprenticeship, technical college, employer training, licensing or a combination.
AI infrastructure is one source of demand
Technology companies are among the Alliance’s founders and members, and data-center and AI infrastructure has drawn attention to electricians, technicians and construction trades. But the 1.7 million estimate spans a far broader set of occupations and includes replacement hiring. Separately, Google said September 24 that it is funding programs to help 25,000 veterans and military families move into skilled-trades careers through Hiring Our Heroes, Student Veterans of America and the Home Builders Institute.
What to watch
The data that would show whether the shortage turns into durable local opportunity are Georgia occupation-level openings, apprenticeship completions, wages and placement rates.
Sources
- Ford Motor Company, “Alliance for America’s Skilled Trades expands national report,” September 30, 2026. https://www.fromtheroad.ford.com/us/en/articles/2026/alliance-for-americas-skilled-trades-expands-national-report
- Google, “Helping 25,000 veterans and military families build careers in skilled trades,” September 24, 2026. https://blog.google/company-news/outreach-and-initiatives/creating-opportunity/veterans-skilled-trades/
Featured photo: Graduates of the Oregon Tradeswomen pre-apprenticeship program and U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh at the NECA-IBEW Electrical Training Center in Portland, Oregon, in 2022. Representative image; it is not connected to the report. Photo: U.S. Department of Labor, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0). Cropped from the original.
.jpg){kind=link}