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Minnesota Chamber warns growth has slowed, urges focus on productivity and migration
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Summary
The Minnesota Chamber told the committee the state ranks highly on many measures but has seen decelerating GDP per capita and weak domestic in‑migration; the Chamber recommended policy focus on productivity, workforce participation and migration to sustain long‑term growth.
Lauren Schadhorst, director of workplace management and workforce development policy at the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, presented findings from the Chamber Foundation’s 2026 Business Benchmarks report. Schadhorst said Minnesota still scores well on measures of innovation and education but has seen per‑capita growth slow in recent years.
“We are consistently in the top five to 10 states in a long list of metrics, but our economy’s growth has been decelerating,” Schadhorst told the committee, saying Minnesota’s per‑capita GDP growth in the first half of the decade averaged about 1% annually and now ranks around 38th among states in that measure.
Schadhorst framed three levers for workforce growth: natural population growth, higher labor‑force participation, and net migration. She said participation gains have been meaningful — including notable increases in participation among Minnesotans of color — but because Minnesota’s participation is already high, migration and productivity are critical to increase the working‑age population.
On migration, Schadhorst said domestic in‑migration has been a persistent weakness and that Minnesota has experienced negative net domestic migration in 20 of the past 25 years, although more recent census figures showed a net positive domestic migration of about 8,000 people in 2025. She told members the Chamber supports efforts to ease federal immigration bottlenecks that limit the legal flow of workers.
Committee members asked whether recent state policies (paid family and medical leave, education investments) might be attracting workers; Schadhorst said the Chamber tracks a wide set of factors but that migration decisions are complex and include cost of living, housing and tax competitiveness. She identified productivity improvements, investments in work‑based learning and removing barriers to public‑private workforce partnerships as policy areas the Chamber recommends exploring.
Why it matters: the Chamber framed Minnesota’s competitiveness as a combination of high quality of life and policy choices that influence attraction and retention of workers; the presentation fed later committee questions about immigration, taxes, entrepreneurship and education‑to‑employment strategies.
The committee did not take action but used the briefing to press for data on migration demographics and to discuss policy tradeoffs.
