By Moustafa Daly
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) publishes relevant employment figures in each state, down to the county level, so that EB-5 investors can find out which areas qualify for a lower EB-5 investment of $800,00. The figures are usually released after the conclusion of the calendar year, and the 2022 figures have been released by the bureau on April 21, 2023.
The data shows that the US national unemployment rate has decreased to 3.65 percent in 2022, down from 5.5 percent in 2021.
TEAs are usually areas with unemployment rates reaching 150% or more of the national rate, meaning that the threshold for an area to qualify as a TEA for an EB-5 investment this year is 5.48 percent. In other words, areas with unemployment rate equals to or exceeds 5.48 percent in the data could qualify as EB-5 TEAs.
Tracking the new data is the EB-5 TEA Finders Tool, which investors and industry stakeholders can use to find the counties and areas that qualify to be considered as targeted employment areas. The TEA Mapping App is released periodically in a collaboration between EB-5 Investors Magazine and Impact DataSource.
“On April 21st, 2023 the BLS finalized the calendar year 2022 county-level estimates (replacing 2021 as the latest calendar year available). This is important because this county-level data is part of the “census-share” calculation. Census-share analysis is one of the two main methodologies for census tract calculations that the EB-5 industry believes USCIS will accept for high unemployment TEAs,” explains Michael Kester, partner and senior economist at Impact DataSource.
“In general, this finalized annual county-level data showed less significant revisions to the preliminary data than from the last few years. 2020 and 2021 data showed more fluctuation between the preliminary and final data due to COVID,” said Kester.
“Looking ahead, the next main data release that will impact high unemployment TEAs will be the new American Community Survey (ACS) data that is scheduled to be released in December 2023,” he adds.
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