Windell Garmondeh, employee at Aurora, talked with Gerry Gilbert, a resident at Aurora on France senior living Wednesday May 1, 2024 in Edina, Minn. (Jerry Holt/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Minnesota’s stretched labor market has loosened in recent months as more people have joined the workforce, but the continued mismatch between too many job openings and not enough workers is unlikely to resolve any time soon.

Nearly 10,000 Minnesotans joined the labor force, and the state added more than 37,000 jobs in 2024, down from nearly 51,000 in 2023, according to data the state Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) released Thursday. The state’s labor force participation rate – the percentage of the working age population working or actively seeking work – has hovered around 68%, compared to about 63% nationally.

December marked Minnesota’s sixth-consecutive month of job growth, with 4,100 new jobs. Two sectors — education and health services and government — led gains, largely from hiring in health care and social assistance and local government. Meanwhile, 3,300 jobseekers entered the labor market.

“Employers continue to create good-paying jobs, and more Minnesotans are looking for work this month – two positive indicators for Minnesota’s economy,” DEED Commissioner Matt Varilek said in a statement. “Our economy has momentum, and we’re planning to keep it going in 2025 through targeted workforce development investments and ongoing support for businesses looking to launch, expand and create jobs all over Minnesota.”

Like surrounding states, Minnesota had less than one unemployed person per job opening in November, the most recent month reported. An aging population and a slowdown in domestic migration have contributed to the deficit.

“We’re still in a tight labor market, and I would expect that to be the case for the next 10, 15 years, until the next generation is fully in the labor force,” Angelina Nguyễn, DEED’s labor market information director, said Jan. 15 at the Minneapolis Fed’s 2025 Regional Economic Conditions Conference.

International migration has helped remedy the labor shortage in Minnesota and across the country. The crackdown on both documented and undocumented immigration under President Donald Trump could reverse that Even before immigration to Minnesota dropped off at the height of the pandemic, Nguyễn said at the Fed event, the number of new arrivals fell far short of job openings.

“The number of people coming into Minnesota in ‘normal times’ was in the tens of thousands, whereas the job vacancies that we’re seeing now are in the hundreds of thousands,” she said. “So immigration can definitely help with the tight labor market, but it in itself alone cannot solve the labor tightness.”