NH needs a workforce farm system

Jayson Seaman

Since 2020, our research team at the University of New Hampshire — the New Hampshire Youth Retention Initiative (YRI) — has been studying how young people view the Granite State as a place to live, learn and work.

Across many interviews, surveys and community conversations, including with youth 13-18, we’ve heard a consistent refrain: Young people value life in New Hampshire, but many are unsure if they can build futures here.

In the past year, several major statewide reports have added detail to this picture: Stay Work Play NH’s 2025 “Quality of Life Survey,” the 2025 Gallup–New Hampshire Learning Initiative (NHLI) “Harnessing Opportunity” study, the NH Business and Industry Association’s “Blueprint NH 2030,” among others. Together, they tell “a tale of two New Hampshires” — conflicting storylines with different implications for business and workforce development strategy.

One New Hampshire: The attraction story

We hear about one New Hampshire in online rankings and relocation campaigns. It is the state rated the freest in America. Business formations are strong, unemployment is low and innovation is thriving. It is a top destination for families and remote workers and widely appreciated for its outdoor recreation assets.

This New Hampshire is the fastest-growing state in a region otherwise growing slowly. Newcomers contribute higher levels of education, school-aged children and significant economic resources, including more than $1.1 billion in annual income.

In this New Hampshire, strong communities, abundant natural amenities and feelings of safety are real advantages. In-migration has buoyed the state demographically and economically at a time when many places are experiencing decline.

The other New Hampshire: The limited opportunity story

There is another New Hampshire, less visible in the first story, but readily apparent in other data and to the young people already here. In this story, youth feel they need to leave New Hampshire to experience success; career pathways are unclear, higher education seems inaccessible and staying implies a lack of ambition.

This story surfaces in places like Stay Work Play NH’s 2025 Quality of Life study, where half of young adults surveyed rated the state worse than others for job quality (up from 46% in 2023), with the most highly educated residents responding the most pessimistically.

In our YRI research, adolescents understandably describe wanting to leave New Hampshire for new experiences, relationships and independence. But they also express ambivalence. Many want to stay but question whether their perspectives will be valued, jobs will support life goals or housing will be affordable.

According to Gallup-NHLI, two-thirds of middle schoolers report having few or no career-connected learning opportunities despite wanting them. These mixed signals and disjointed experiences contribute to the tensions we heard from young people in our research.

This story is less a critique of the first and more a reflection of what the state looks like from a young person’s perspective: mixed messaging about education’s value, ominous signs about high costs and career pathways that are insufficiently organized to inspire confidence. These perceptions matter, because they shape how young people imagine their futures and ultimately where they choose to build their lives.

Where the two New Hampshires collide: Workforce

A section in NH Housing’s 2025 report was aptly titled “Workforce challenges in an aging state.” New Hampshire boasts the second-highest median age in the country and the seventh-highest share of residents over 65. More than 27% of the state’s workforce is 55 or older, the highest percentage in the nation. The NH BEA projects nearly 197,000 job openings among New Hampshire’s 80 top occupations by 2032.

The Georgetown University Center for Education and the Workforce reports that nearly 70% of New Hampshire occupations with the most openings by 2031 will require education beyond high school. Registered apprenticeships are growing, but workforce development overall suffers from “extreme lack of coordination and alignment,” in the BIA’s words.

Just-in-time approaches to training and hiring won’t close the gap. Apprenticeships can take years to complete, and the largest share of job openings will still require a bachelor’s degree. Without action, the retirement wave will leave employers with too few workers and unable to grow their businesses.

The main challenge ahead is not whether people want to move to New Hampshire; they do. Or whether New Hampshire has a business-friendly tax and regulatory climate; it does. It is whether New Hampshire youth see clear, supported pathways into the workforce and can participate in New Hampshire’s prosperity and quality of life too. Attraction is not our vulnerability; retention is.

New Hampshire needs to build a farm system for all careers

To merge these storylines, New Hampshire must strengthen the systems connecting supply and demand: the supply of anticipated jobs and the demand expressed by youth formulating future plans. We need educational pathways that function like what a May 29, 2025, Time magazine article called a “farm-club system for American jobs, backed by private enterprise and public policy.” Such a system begins with early career exposure, builds during hands-on programs in adolescence, and extends into and through postsecondary education.

Just as professional sport teams depend on a developmental pipeline, a functioning farm system recognizes that the secondary-postsecondary transition is when decisions are most acute but that future plans start forming much earlier. Gallup–NHLI shows that even one career-connected learning experience in middle school creates job awareness and fosters hope.

In this sense, youth development and economic development are two sides of the same coin. And to ensure that the attraction story remains strong and true, this farm system must include backbone sectors like health and social care, public safety, education and resource stewardship — fields essential to an aging state and the outdoor assets that appeal to so many prime-age newcomers.

From two New Hampshires to one future

These stories may seem ideologically distinct, but they are economically interdependent. Fortunately, we do not need to choose one or the other. State leaders, however, must recognize that our economic vitality now depends on whether young people can see a future here.

By investing in a broad, accessible farm system across all sectors, New Hampshire can weave its two stories into one coherent narrative about the future.

Jayson Seaman is the chair of the Department of Recreation Management & Policy at the University of New Hampshire. He also co-leads the New Hampshire Youth Retention Initiative (YRI), an interdisciplinary research program that investigates how rural youth imagine and plan their futures amidst economic and cultural change. The content of this commentary is solely the responsibility of the author and does not necessarily represent the official views of the University of New Hampshire.

In our YRI research, adolescents understandably describe wanting to leave New Hampshire for new experiences, relationships and independence.