The United States is charging headfirst into a mining revival—at least on paper. The government has levied copper tariffs on Chinese imports and is offering hundreds of millions in grants and loans for battery supply chains. Perhaps most symbolically, the Department of Defense now owns a nearly 50% stake in MP Materials, the country’s lone rare earth producer. From a policy perspective, I think the message is clear: We want to mine at home again. But there’s a problem no one seems eager to talk about and that’s that the U.S. doesn’t have enough skilled people.
The Collapse Of A Talent Pipeline
America hasn’t just lost mining capacity—we’ve lost the very ecosystem that sustains it. Over the past two decades, most of the country’s mining engineering programs have shut down. According to the Society for Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (SME), the number of U.S. universities offering accredited mining engineering degrees is roughly half of what it used to be in the 1980s. Enrollment is also down more than 50% from its peak.
The business world is already feeling the effects. In 2023, a McKinsey & Company survey found that 71% of mining leaders were experiencing a talent shortage, with 86% of mining executives saying it was harder to recruit and retain talent, compared to two years earlier. Today, we are trying to restart an industry without engineers, geologists, surveyors or skilled tradespeople. It’s as if we’ve decided to launch a national airline without pilots or mechanics.
In theory, foreign talent could help fill the gap. Countries like Australia, South Africa and Chile continue to train large numbers of mining professionals. But in practice, I believe the U.S. immigration system is unprepared to meet this moment. H-1B visas are designed more for those with advanced degrees and specialized skill sets—think software developers, not shotcrete operators. And even if companies sponsor employment-based green cards, the processing timeline reached a new high this year, with applicants waiting, on average, 3.4 years to be approved.
