Frequently asked questions

The Workforce Understory surfaces a central challenge: Hawaiʻi has many workers, employers, programs, and opportunities, but they do not yet function as a coordinated system capable of delivering living-wage mobility at scale. These questions summarize what the evidence tells us, what remains uncertain, and where Hawaiʻi might act next.

Workforce Ecosystem FAQ

FAQ by Stakeholder

FAQ by County

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Workforce Ecosystem FAQ

Hawaiʻi’s labor market

What the evidence tells us
No, not under current projections. Hawaiʻi expects roughly 371,600 job openings between 2022 and 2032, but only about 101,200—less than one-third—are projected to pay a living wage. Compared with approximately 170,500 new workforce entrants, that provides a living-wage opening for about 59%, leaving roughly four in ten without one available.
What to keep in mind
The gap varies sharply by county, and these projections cannot account for future wage growth, improvements in job quality, or new industries.
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- How many projected job openings will pay a living wage? · What share of Hawaiʻi’s projected workforce entrants will have access to a living-wage job?
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi has many job openings, but too few combine living wages, accessibility, stability, and clear advancement. Employers may face persistent vacancies while workers encounter jobs that do not cover basic costs or degree requirements that exclude people with relevant skills and experience. The result is a mismatch between the workers available and the quality and accessibility of the jobs being offered.
What to keep in mind
Hiring difficulty does not always indicate a shortage of skilled workers. Pay, scheduling, working conditions, housing, childcare, transportation, geography, and unnecessary credential requirements can all affect whether workers can realistically accept and remain in a job.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi is not a single labor market. Each county has a different mix of employers, industries, educational institutions, transportation options, and living-wage jobs. From 2022 to 2032, projected living-wage openings could serve about 62% of new workforce entrants in Honolulu, compared with 45% in Maui County, 34% in Hawaiʻi County, and 29% in Kauaʻi County. Where someone lives therefore shapes which careers exist, which pathways are accessible, and whether advancement requires leaving home.
What to keep in mind
Countywide figures can still conceal major differences within islands, including long travel distances, uneven access to training, and the concentration of jobs in particular communities.
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What the evidence tells us
Honolulu has Hawaiʻi’s largest and most diverse labor market, with more employers, industries, educational institutions, and living-wage pathways. About 62% of projected workforce entrants have a corresponding living-wage opening, compared with 45% in Maui County, 34% on Hawaiʻi Island, and 29% on Kauaʻi. Honolulu also has substantially more job volume in emerging mobility sectors such as Information and Technology and Construction.
What to keep in mind
Honolulu still falls far short of universal opportunity: approximately 44,600 projected entrants lack a corresponding living-wage opening, and access varies significantly across Oʻahu’s communities.
Explore the evidence — Living-wage opportunity
Explore the evidence — Industry opportunity
What the evidence tells us
Both, but job quality and alignment are the broader statewide constraints. Employers face real shortages in certain occupations and communities, yet Hawaiʻi is projected to create far more openings than living-wage opportunities. Many industries have jobs that are accessible, well-paying, or growing—but few consistently combine all three conditions. Filling vacancies alone will therefore not ensure that more residents can build sustainable careers.
What to keep in mind
The balance differs by county, industry, and occupation. Some employers genuinely need more trained workers, while others may be experiencing turnover or recruitment challenges connected to wages, schedules, working conditions, housing, or limited advancement.
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Underemployed or underserved populations

What the evidence tells us
STARs are workers who are Skilled Through Alternative Routes rather than through a four-year degree. They may have developed valuable skills through community college, certificates, apprenticeships, military service, employer training, work experience, or self-directed learning. STARs are not a small subgroup: they represent approximately 63% of Hawaiʻi workers age 25 and older with earnings.
What to keep in mind
STARs are a diverse population with different credentials, occupations, experience, earnings, and career goals. The term describes how workers gained their skills; it does not suggest that everyone needs the same training or support.
Explore the evidence
- What share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce consists of STARs versus four-year degree holders?
- Across Hawaiʻi industries, where are STAR workers finding job opportunities?
What the evidence tells us
Approximately 63% of Hawaiʻi workers age 25 and older with earnings are STARs—more than six in ten workers statewide. The share is even higher on the Neighbor Islands: about 68% on Hawaiʻi Island and 69% in Maui and Kauaʻi counties, compared with 61% in Honolulu.
What to keep in mind
These percentages describe how workers developed their skills, not their ability, experience, earnings, or readiness to advance. STARs include workers across nearly every industry and occupation.
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What the evidence tells us
Yes, they can. Nearly two-thirds of Hawaiʻi’s workforce is Skilled Through Alternative Routes, yet 41% of projected living-wage openings are in occupations that typically require a bachelor’s degree. When employers use a degree as a general screening tool rather than a job-related necessity, they may overlook experienced workers who gained relevant skills through employment, community college, apprenticeships, military service, or other pathways.
What to keep in mind
The data does not show which individual degree requirements are unnecessary. Some roles genuinely require specialized higher education, while others may be opened through skills-based hiring without reducing standards.
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- What share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce has developed skills through alternative routes?
- What education levels are typically required to access projected living-wage jobs?
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi’s economy does not generate enough college-level, living-wage roles to fully use the talent it educates. Only 43% of four-year graduates are working in jobs that typically require a degree within five years. Outcomes also vary sharply by program: the largest UH programs often remain below a living wage, while the fields producing stronger wages tend to serve fewer graduates or offer limited local opportunities.
What to keep in mind
Underemployment does not necessarily mean a graduate’s education has no value. The available data cannot fully explain whether someone chose their role, works outside their field, lacks a suitable local opening, or remains in mission-driven work despite lower pay.
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What the evidence tells us
Wages are shaped by more than a worker’s skills. Industry economics, employer practices, bargaining power, available hours, and access to higher-paying roles all influence earnings. Hawaiʻi relies heavily on skilled workers in essential industries, yet many of those jobs do not consistently provide living wages or clear advancement pathways. The gap often reflects how work is structured and compensated—not a lack of ability or effort.
What to keep in mind
Upskilling may help some workers advance, but training is not a universal solution. When jobs remain low-paid or unstable, progress also requires stronger job quality, employer practice changes, and growth in industries that can support higher wages.
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What the evidence tells us
In this analysis, “within reach” refers to STAR workers earning within $10,000 of their county’s living-wage threshold. These workers may be positioned to cross the threshold through a meaningful raise, increased hours, a promotion, a short-term credential, or movement into a somewhat higher-paying role.
What to keep in mind
“Within reach” is an analytical category, not a prediction. Even a relatively small earnings gap may be difficult to close if workers lack access to advancement, stable hours, training, or suitable higher-paying jobs.
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Economic MObility

What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services is the clearest recurring opportunity, combining substantial STAR hiring with comparatively strong wages and mobility indicators statewide and in several counties. Beyond that, the strongest pathways vary by place: Information and Technology and Construction stand out in Honolulu, while Healthcare and Professional Services emerge more strongly on Kauaʻi, and Hospitality and Healthcare show promise in Maui County.
What to keep in mind
High job-posting volume alone does not signal strong mobility. An industry must also provide accessible roles, living-wage earnings, and realistic advancement—and those conditions can differ significantly by county.
Explore the evidence
- Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Hawaiʻi industries?
- Where is economic mobility emerging across Honolulu industries?
What the evidence tells us
These classifications describe how strongly an industry combines STAR access, living-wage earnings, hiring demand, and momentum. Anchor industries already show strong mobility potential. Building industries have promising conditions that could be strengthened. Partial industries offer some opportunity, but wages, access, or advancement remain uneven. Limited industries may employ or recruit many STARs without consistently providing living-wage mobility.
What to keep in mind
The classifications describe industry patterns, not every employer or occupation. An industry can also fall into different categories by county because local wages, job mix, and demand vary.
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What the evidence tells us
An industry’s mobility potential depends on local conditions. Wages, occupational mix, employer demand, STAR access, hiring momentum, and the county living-wage threshold can all differ. Healthcare, for example, appears more promising in Kauaʻi and Maui counties than it does statewide because the local mix of jobs and earnings produces a stronger opportunity profile.
What to keep in mind
County classifications describe regional patterns, not every employer or occupation. A promising industry may still contain low-wage jobs, while a Limited industry may include specific employers offering strong pathways.
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What the evidence tells us
No. High posting volume shows where employers are actively recruiting, but it does not tell us whether those jobs provide living wages, stable hours, benefits, or advancement. Some high-volume industries offer strong mobility, while others remain classified as Partial or Limited because access to work does not consistently translate into economic security. High demand can also reflect persistent vacancies or turnover.
What to keep in mind
Job postings measure recruitment activity rather than unique, successfully filled positions. Understanding opportunity requires looking at hiring volume alongside wages, STAR access, growth, job quality, and pathways for advancement.
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What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services is the strongest recurring example, combining substantial STAR hiring with comparatively favorable wages and mobility indicators. Other promising industries depend on local conditions: Healthcare stands out on Hawaiʻi Island, Kauaʻi, and Maui; Information and Technology and Construction show greater potential in Honolulu; and Utilities offers strong outcomes but relatively few openings.
What to keep in mind
No industry provides uniformly strong opportunity. Wages, degree requirements, job quality, and advancement can vary widely among occupations and employers within the same sector.
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What the evidence tells us
Not necessarily. Training creates mobility only when workers can move into real higher-wage openings, promotions, or redesigned jobs. Honolulu has a broader set of destination industries, while the Neighbor Islands have fewer employers and thinner Building-sector capacity. In some regions, expanding training without developing jobs in parallel could produce skilled workers who still cannot find living-wage roles locally.
What to keep in mind
Job-posting volume does not prove that enough suitable positions exist for every graduate. Planning should connect cohort size to verified employer demand, expected openings, advancement commitments, and the number of workers each regional labor market can realistically absorb.
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Moving workers into better opportunities

What the evidence tells us
No. Training produces economic mobility when it connects people to real employer demand, higher-paying roles, and continued advancement. Workers may also need career navigation, coaching, financial and logistical support, and employers prepared to recognize their new skills. Without those connections, someone can complete a valuable program or credential and still remain in the same job—or find no suitable opportunity locally.
What to keep in mind
Different workers face different barriers. Some need new skills, while others already have the necessary capabilities but encounter low wages, degree screens, limited openings, or workplaces without clear paths for advancement.
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What the evidence tells us
Workforce pathways are rarely simple or self-explanatory. Workers may need help understanding which careers are realistic, comparing training options, translating prior experience, accessing financial or logistical supports, and moving from one opportunity to the next. Navigation and coaching provide the connective support that helps education, work-based learning, training, and employment function as a coherent pathway rather than a series of disconnected programs.
What to keep in mind
Coaching cannot compensate for low-quality training or a lack of higher-paying jobs. It is most valuable when advisors have reliable labor-market information, strong employer relationships, and the capacity to stay with workers through key transitions.
Explore the evidence
- What share of Hawaiʻi’s annual workforce entrants has known access to paid internships or high-quality work-based learning?
- What does the full system cost look like when intermediary infrastructure is included alongside direct internship costs?
What the evidence tells us
High-quality work-based learning is paid, connected to real career pathways, and built around meaningful work rather than leftover tasks. Participants need clear expectations, structured supervision, regular feedback, and opportunities to build skills and professional networks. Employers also need enough capacity and support to design strong roles, coach participants, and connect successful experiences to future employment.
What to keep in mind
Creating a placement is not the same as creating a quality experience. Wage funding is essential, but without thoughtful role design, employer readiness, intermediary support, and clear measures of success, participation can grow while learning and long-term value remain limited.
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What the evidence tells us
Yes. Paying workers and learners makes career-building opportunities accessible to people who cannot afford to give up income while gaining experience or credentials. Compensation also recognizes that participants contribute real value to employers. Paid pathways can broaden participation, reduce financial barriers, and allow people to build skills and professional networks without choosing between learning and meeting basic needs.
What to keep in mind
Wages alone do not guarantee a quality pathway. Paid experiences still need meaningful work, structured supervision, coaching, clear learning goals, and connections to future employment or advancement.
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What the evidence tells us
Employers should help define the skills they need, co-design training, provide paid learning opportunities, prepare supervisors, and create clear routes into hiring or promotion. Their role extends beyond identifying vacancies: employers help ensure that training reflects real work, that newly developed skills are recognized, and that workers have a destination after completing the pathway.
What to keep in mind
Small employers may not have the staff or resources to build pathways alone. Intermediaries can coordinate recruitment, program design, supervision support, and shared costs while preserving meaningful employer commitment.
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What the evidence tells us
Often, yes. Existing employees already understand the workplace, have demonstrated relevant skills, and may need only targeted training or a promotion to move into harder-to-fill roles. Advancing incumbent workers can improve retention, reduce recruitment costs, and create entry-level openings for new workers—while helping employers build talent from within rather than repeatedly competing for the same external candidates.
What to keep in mind
Advancement works only when employers create real higher-paying roles, recognize new skills, and plan for the positions workers leave behind. Otherwise, the strategy may simply shift a vacancy or preserve the same low-wage job structure.
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What the evidence tells us
Skills-based hiring matters most when workers already have the capabilities to succeed but are screened out by unnecessary degree or credential requirements. In those cases, providing more training can duplicate skills people already possess. Employers can expand access by defining the competencies a role actually requires, assessing candidates on those skills, and recognizing experience gained through work, community college, apprenticeships, military service, and other routes.
What to keep in mind
Removing a degree requirement should not mean lowering standards. Some occupations require specialized education or licensure, and other workers may still need targeted training to close genuine skill gaps.
Explore the evidence
- What share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce consists of STARs versus four-year degree holders?
- What education levels are typically required to access projected living-wage jobs? · Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Hawaiʻi industries?

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Hawaiʻi’s Generational Workforce Commitment

What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi’s Generational Workforce Commitment is a shared 20-year goal: By 2045, all people of Hawaiʻi will have a path to a career that enables them to learn, work, and thrive in Hawaiʻi—contributing to a vibrant local economy grounded in community values. It provides a common direction for employers, educators, government, funders, workforce organizations, and communities to align their efforts over time.
What to keep in mind
The commitment is not a single program or the work of one organization. Different islands and institutions will contribute in different ways, but progress depends on shared responsibility, sustained coordination, and measurable outcomes.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi faces a connected set of long-term challenges: too few living-wage opportunities, major differences among counties, limited access to paid pathways, and systems that often fail to recognize the skills workers already have. These conditions span education, employment, economic development, and public policy. Meaningful progress therefore requires sustained coordination across institutions and generations—not a series of isolated programs or short-term initiatives.
What to keep in mind
A shared commitment does not require every region or organization to use the same strategy. It provides a common long-term direction while allowing solutions to reflect different workers, industries, and island economies.
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What the evidence tells us
Workforce development helps people build skills and navigate into opportunity; economic development shapes whether enough good opportunities exist. Training workers without expanding living-wage jobs, improving existing roles, or strengthening promising industries can leave people better prepared but still unable to advance locally. Hawaiʻi needs to invest simultaneously in workers, employers, job quality, and the regional economies that create sustainable career destinations.
What to keep in mind
Economic development does not only mean attracting new industries. It can also mean raising wages, redesigning jobs, creating career ladders, supporting local employers, and strengthening sectors that already matter to each island.
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What the evidence tells us
Sustained investment could help successive groups of workers move into higher-paying roles, generating earnings gains that compound over time. As workers spend more locally, those gains could also support businesses, jobs, and broader economic activity. The county models project impacts ranging from hundreds of millions of dollars on the Neighbor Islands to roughly $2 billion in Honolulu over ten years.
What to keep in mind
These are modeled scenarios, not guaranteed returns. The benefits depend on workers completing pathways, employers providing enough higher-wage roles, earnings gains lasting, and additional spending remaining within local economies.
Explore the evidence — Cumulative worker earnings
Explore the evidence — Local economic impact
What the evidence tells us
Employers must help create the opportunity the workforce system is preparing people to enter. That means defining real skill needs, removing unnecessary degree requirements, offering paid learning, investing in incumbent workers, and creating clear routes into hiring and advancement. It also means improving wages, schedules, supervision, and job quality so that recruitment leads to retention and workers can build sustainable careers.
What to keep in mind
Employers should not be expected to build complete pathways alone. Educators, intermediaries, government, and funders can provide coordination and resources—but employer participation, verified demand, and real advancement opportunities are essential.
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What the evidence tells us
Educators and training providers must connect learning to real regional opportunity. That means designing programs around verified employer demand, creating clear and navigable pathways, recognizing prior learning, and making participation possible for people balancing work, family, transportation, and financial responsibilities. Success should be measured by whether learners complete programs, enter stronger employment, increase their earnings, and continue advancing over time.
What to keep in mind
Education has value beyond immediate employment, and providers cannot create good jobs on their own. Strong outcomes require sustained partnership with employers, workforce intermediaries, government, and communities—and regular adjustment when labor-market conditions change.
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What the evidence tells us
Government must align workforce, education, economic-development, and public-funding decisions around shared long-term outcomes. That includes investing in paid pathways and coordination, improving the data needed to track progress, removing policy barriers, and ensuring statewide strategies can be adapted to each county’s economy. Government also helps create the conditions for good jobs through infrastructure, procurement, regulation, and sector-development policy.
What to keep in mind
Statewide alignment should not produce a one-size-fits-all system. Government must provide durable infrastructure and accountability while giving regional partners the authority and resources to respond to local industries, workers, and geography.
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What the evidence tells us
Philanthropy can fund the connective work that traditional programs and public systems often leave unsupported: coordination, employer engagement, navigation, shared data, intermediary capacity, and regional experimentation. Funders can also provide patient capital to test promising approaches, learn what works across different islands, and help successful models become durable public or employer-supported infrastructure.
What to keep in mind
Philanthropy cannot finance Hawaiʻi’s workforce system indefinitely or create good jobs on its own. Its greatest value lies in reducing risk, aligning partners, filling strategic gaps, and helping government and employers adopt and sustain effective approaches.
Explore the evidence
What share of Hawaiʻi’s annual workforce entrants has known access to paid internships or high-quality work-based learning?
What does the full system cost look like when intermediary infrastructure is included alongside direct internship costs?
How does cost allocation shift under different internship funding models?
What could sustained workforce investment accomplish across Hawaiʻi’s counties?
What the evidence tells us
Workforce intermediaries must help turn disconnected programs and institutions into coherent pathways. They connect workers with opportunities, help employers define and meet talent needs, coordinate educators and training providers, align funding, and track whether participants reach stronger employment and earnings. Their value lies in managing the relationships and transitions that no single organization can carry alone.
What to keep in mind
Intermediary capacity should fit regional scale. Some functions require trusted local relationships, while others—such as technology, data, administration, and shared standards—may be more sustainable through statewide or cross-county infrastructure.
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What the evidence tells us
Workers and communities should help define what a good job, meaningful opportunity, and the ability to thrive in Hawaiʻi actually look like. Their experience can reveal barriers that institutional data misses, test whether pathways are accessible, and shape how programs, employer practices, and public investments are designed. The commitment depends on treating people as partners in decision-making—not only as participants in systems created for them.
What to keep in mind
Community engagement must be accessible, compensated, and connected to real influence. The responsibility for fixing structural problems should not be shifted onto workers already navigating low wages, caregiving, transportation, and other pressures.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi needs a portfolio approach. Investment in Honolulu may produce larger and more reliable near-term returns because more employers, pathways, and living-wage jobs already exist. The Neighbor Islands require deliberate capacity-building precisely because opportunity is thinner. Equity does not require identical investments everywhere; it requires directing resources according to each region’s starting point, barriers, and potential.
What to keep in mind
Higher costs or slower early results in smaller labor markets do not necessarily indicate ineffective investment. Building employer coordination, training capacity, and new destination jobs may take longer but is essential to preventing opportunity from becoming even more concentrated on Oʻahu.
Explore the evidence — Regional living-wage opportunity
Explore the evidence — Modeled earnings impact
What the evidence tells us
Progress should be measured by whether more residents can access quality pathways, secure living-wage work, advance over time, and remain in Hawaiʻi. Hawaiʻi should also track job quality, employer retention and hiring outcomes, regional access to opportunity, and whether gains reach workers across different communities. The ultimate test is net workforce mobility: whether the overall economy is creating more good jobs, rather than simply moving some workers upward while others refill the same low-wage roles.
What to keep in mind
No single measure can capture the commitment. Accountability requires shared outcomes, consistent data, regional and demographic breakdowns, and sustained tracking beyond program enrollment or completion.
Explore the evidence — Employment and earnings outcomes: What share of Hawaiʻi’s projected workforce entrants will have access to a living-wage job? · How do UH graduate wages change during the first five years after graduation? · Which UH programs deliver both strong wages and high retention?
Explore the evidence — Pathway and regional access

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Potential Challenges

What the evidence tells us
Workers may complete training yet remain in the same job, move into another low-wage role, become underemployed, or leave their community to find opportunity elsewhere. Programs may report successful enrollment and completion while workers’ earnings and economic security barely change. Without enough higher-paying destination jobs, skill-building alone cannot produce workforce mobility at scale.
What to keep in mind
New skills can still increase confidence, adaptability, and long-term options. But realizing their economic value requires employers to create advancement opportunities, improve existing jobs, and expand demand in industries capable of supporting living-wage careers.
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What the evidence tells us
Workforce development can help people gain skills, navigate opportunities, and compete for existing jobs. Its impact remains limited when the economy does not create enough living-wage roles, improve low-quality jobs, or support industries with real advancement potential. Broad workforce mobility requires both stronger pathways for workers and stronger destinations for those pathways to reach.
What to keep in mind
Economic development alone is also insufficient. New or expanding industries will not benefit local residents equitably unless people can access the education, paid learning, navigation, and hiring pathways those opportunities require.
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What the evidence tells us
When workers advance, their former jobs may disappear, be redesigned, receive higher wages, or be filled by someone else. If low-wage roles are simply backfilled, individual workers may benefit while the overall number of people in low-wage work remains unchanged. True workforce mobility therefore requires improving the structure and quality of entry-level jobs alongside helping people move into better ones.
What to keep in mind
Vacated roles can create valuable entry points into the workforce. But without adequate wages, stable schedules, and genuine routes to advancement, they may continue producing turnover and economic insecurity for each new worker who fills them.
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What the evidence tells us
It can do either. When a worker advances into a living-wage role, that person’s economic position improves. But if their former low-wage job is filled by another worker under the same conditions, the overall living-wage gap may remain largely unchanged. Reducing the gap at scale requires both helping people advance and improving, redesigning, or reducing the number of jobs that leave workers below a living wage.
What to keep in mind
Individual mobility still matters profoundly. The broader accountability question is whether Hawaiʻi is increasing the total share of workers in good jobs—not only changing which individuals occupy the existing mix of higher- and lower-wage roles.
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What the evidence tells us
Some workforce functions may be difficult for smaller counties to sustain independently because participant volume, employer demand, funding, and specialized staffing are limited. A stronger model may combine shared statewide infrastructure—such as data systems, technology, administration, and common standards—with trusted local organizations that coordinate employers, workers, educators, and community partners. This preserves regional responsiveness without requiring every county to rebuild the same capacity.
What to keep in mind
Shared infrastructure should not replace local leadership. Smaller counties may still need dedicated intermediaries or sector partnerships where relationships, geography, and industry conditions require sustained place-based coordination.
Explore the evidence — Infrastructure and cost
- What does the full system cost look like when intermediary infrastructure is included alongside direct internship costs?
- How does cost allocation shift under different internship funding models?
Explore the evidence — Regional scale and opportunity
What the evidence tells us
When workers earn more, part of that additional income may be spent at local businesses, supporting further economic activity beyond the initial wage gain. The county models use a 1.4 economic multiplier, meaning every additional dollar in worker earnings is modeled to generate about 40 cents in further local activity. Sustained workforce investment could therefore benefit workers, employers, and the broader regional economy.
What to keep in mind
These figures are modeled scenarios, not direct measurements of how much money remains on each island. Actual effects depend on local spending patterns, imports, business ownership, housing costs, and how much additional income circulates within the county.
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From Commitment to Implementaton

What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should begin by agreeing on a small set of shared outcomes, identifying priority regional or sector opportunities, and naming who is responsible for moving each one forward. Early action should focus where worker need, employer demand, and living-wage potential intersect. Hawaiʻi must also fund the coordination, employer engagement, navigation, and data capacity required to turn separate programs into functioning pathways.
What to keep in mind
Hawaiʻi does not need a complete statewide system before acting. Initial priorities can serve as demonstrations, provided partners measure results, learn across regions, and adapt the strategy over time.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should coordinate shared goals, definitions, quality standards, data systems, funding structures, policy, and common tools statewide. Employer engagement, industry priorities, pathway design, learner supports, and day-to-day implementation should be led regionally, where partners understand local jobs, assets, barriers, and relationships.
What to keep in mind
The division is not absolute. Statewide infrastructure should make local action easier without forcing every region into the same model, while regional experience should continually inform statewide policy, funding, and learning.
Explore the evidence — Shared infrastructure
- How many employers would need to participate for Hawaiʻi to reach universal paid-pathway access?
- What would the full cost of scaling paid pathways look like when intermediary infrastructure is included?
Explore the evidence — Regional variation
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should begin where several conditions align: verified employer demand, accessible entry points for local workers, living-wage destination jobs, realistic advancement routes, and regional partners able to support implementation. Anchor industries offer strong foundations, while high-volume Building industries may provide the greatest opportunity for targeted investment. Worker experience should help verify that the proposed pathway is accessible, worthwhile, and connected to a real job.
What to keep in mind
Industry-level data identifies promising places to investigate, not ready-made pathways. Priorities should be validated at the occupation and employer level before Hawaiʻi expands training or recruits workers.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi needs shared navigation tools, common coaching and pathway-quality standards, regional and industry intermediaries, coordinated employer engagement, and infrastructure for paid work-based learning. It also needs connected data systems and measurement capacity to track participation, employment, retention, wage progression, and whether people continue advancing. These functions provide the connective tissue that allows strong individual programs to operate as a coherent workforce system.
What to keep in mind
Shared infrastructure does not require one centralized organization. Hawaiʻi will likely need common statewide tools, standards, funding, and data paired with regional partners that build relationships and deliver support locally.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should treat implementation as a continuing cycle of regional demonstration, measurement, community feedback, and adaptation. New pathways should begin with evidence and verified demand, then test whether workers can access, complete, and benefit from them in practice. Results from different counties should be compared so promising approaches can be strengthened, adapted, or discontinued rather than assumed to work everywhere.
What to keep in mind
A 20-year commitment cannot depend on a fixed plan created at the beginning. Hawaiʻi needs stable goals and shared measures, but enough flexibility to respond to changing industries, technologies, worker experiences, and regional conditions.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi can describe job openings, wages, educational requirements, and broad workforce patterns, but it cannot yet consistently follow people and jobs through the full pathway. The state needs better information about job quality, worksite location, hours, pathway participation and completion, placement, wage progression, resident retention, employer outcomes, barriers to participation, and whether upward movement actually reduces the number of workers below a living wage.
What to keep in mind
More data alone will not improve decisions. Hawaiʻi also needs shared definitions, responsible data governance, connected systems, regional interpretation, and regular feedback from workers and employers.
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What the evidence tells us
A coordinated strategy would establish a common statewide direction, shared definitions and measures, durable data and pathway infrastructure, aligned public and philanthropic investment, and clear responsibility for results. Regions would then translate that foundation into locally relevant industry priorities, employer partnerships, training pathways, and worker supports. Progress would be reviewed regularly so Hawaiʻi can strengthen what works, adapt what does not, and respond to changing conditions.
What to keep in mind
Statewide coordination should create alignment without imposing uniformity. Success will require clearly defined roles, sustained resources, regional decision-making authority, and accountability for whether workers actually reach and remain in living-wage careers.
Explore the evidence — Shared infrastructure: What share of Hawaiʻi’s annual workforce entrants has known access to paid internships or high-quality work-based learning? · How many employers would need to participate for Hawaiʻi to reach 17,000 annual paid pathway opportunities? · What would the full annual cost of scaling paid pathways look like when intermediary infrastructure is included?
Explore the evidence — Regional differentiation

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FAQ by County

Hawaiʻi County | Honolulu County | Kauaʻi County | Maui County

Hawaiʻi County

What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi County is projected to have approximately 25,000 people enter its workforce between 2022 and 2032, compared with about 8,600 projected living-wage job openings. Those openings are equivalent to only about 34% of future workforce entrants, suggesting that the county’s current mix of jobs will not provide enough living-wage opportunities for everyone expected to enter the labor market. Closing that gap will require a combination of creating more living-wage jobs, improving wages and job quality within existing occupations, and helping residents access the opportunities that are available.
What to keep in mind
This comparison is a measure of regional opportunity, not a prediction that exactly 34% of entrants will obtain living-wage jobs. Workers may move between counties, compete with existing workers for openings, change jobs more than once, or enter occupations that grow differently than projected. The figures also do not capture living-wage jobs created through future economic-development efforts or wage increases that move existing jobs above the threshold.
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- How does the number of workers entering Hawaiʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
What the evidence tells us
Employer hiring challenges and resident opportunity shortages can exist at the same time because the issue is not simply the number of workers or job openings. Hawaiʻi County is projected to have far fewer living-wage openings than people entering the workforce, while the available jobs require different combinations of education, experience, skills, location, schedules, and working conditions. Employers may therefore struggle to fill particular positions even as many residents cannot find work that is accessible, stable, well-matched to their skills, and sufficient to support their families. Addressing this mismatch requires attention to job quality and access alongside training and recruitment.
What to keep in mind
The available data identify the scale and structure of the mismatch but do not directly tell us why individual vacancies remain unfilled. Employer and worker engagement is still needed to understand factors such as wages, benefits, scheduling, transportation, childcare, housing, credential requirements, advancement opportunities, and where jobs are located across the island.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi County’s living-wage opportunities span multiple education and training levels, but many require preparation beyond a high school diploma. These pathways may include bachelor’s degrees, associate degrees, postsecondary certificates, apprenticeships, occupational licenses, and substantial workplace training. Workforce strategy should therefore support a range of routes into good jobs rather than treating a four-year degree as the only pathway to economic security.
What to keep in mind
The education level typically associated with an occupation does not describe every employer’s hiring requirements or every worker’s pathway into that career. Credentials must also connect to actual local openings, employer demand, wages, advancement opportunities, and the practical supports residents need to complete training and access jobs across the island.
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- What education levels are required for living-wage job openings on Hawaiʻi Island?
- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings on Hawaiʻi Island, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi County’s projected living-wage opportunities are concentrated in a small number of occupation groups. Business and Management accounts for approximately 36% of projected living-wage openings between 2022 and 2032, followed by Construction and Repair at 19%, Healthcare at 13%, and Education at 13%. Together, these four groups represent more than four in five projected living-wage openings on Hawaiʻi Island. These fields therefore provide important starting points for career navigation, education and training alignment, employer partnerships, and regional pathway development.
What to keep in mind
Broad occupation groups do not show which specific jobs are growing, how accessible they are to local residents, or where the opportunities are located across the island. Some Business and Management roles may require prior experience or advanced education, while Construction, Healthcare, and Education pathways may depend on licenses, apprenticeships, credentials, or public funding. Hawaiʻi County should examine the occupations and employers beneath these categories while also considering how to diversify its relatively concentrated living-wage economy.
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- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings on Hawaiʻi Island, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Healthcare stands out as an Anchor opportunity on Hawaiʻi Island because it combines substantial employer demand, strong access for STAR workers, and meaningful potential for continued advancement. Information and Technology, Utilities, and Management also show emerging promise, although they may currently operate at a smaller scale or require additional pathway development. Together, these industries offer useful starting points for strategies that help workers build on skills gained through work, military service, community experience, and education outside a four-year degree.
What to keep in mind
These classifications identify promising conditions, not guaranteed pathways or complete investment recommendations. Industry-level patterns can mask significant differences among occupations, employers, wages, entry requirements, working conditions, and geographic access across the island. Leaders should validate the signal with local employers and workers before deciding where stronger training, navigation, job-quality improvements, or business-development support would have the greatest impact.
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- Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Hawaiʻi Island industries?
- How are Hawaiʻi Island workers distributed relative to a living wage?
What the evidence tells us
Healthcare stands out as an especially promising mobility opportunity on Hawaiʻi Island because it combines substantial projected demand, meaningful access for STAR workers, and a wide range of occupations that can support continued learning and advancement. Healthcare accounts for a significant share of the county’s projected living-wage openings, and its local mobility conditions appear stronger than the statewide industry pattern. This makes it a strong foundation for coordinated pathways that connect entry-level employment, short-term credentials, incumbent-worker upskilling, and advanced clinical careers.
What to keep in mind
Healthcare is a broad industry, and opportunity is not distributed evenly across every occupation or employer. Some roles remain below a living wage, while others require significant education, licensing, or clinical experience. Workforce investment should therefore be grounded in specific employer needs, occupational shortages, training capacity, job quality, and the supports residents need to enter and progress through local healthcare pathways.
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What the evidence tells us
Among Hawaiʻi Island’s approximately 105,000 STAR workers, about 20,200 earn within $20,000 of the county’s living-wage threshold. This includes roughly 8,750 workers within $10,000 of the threshold and another 11,450 earning between $10,000 and $20,000 below it. Nearly one in five STAR workers may therefore represent an important opportunity for targeted advancement through wage growth, more consistent hours, supervisory opportunities, skills recognition, short-term training, or movement into better-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
Being relatively close to the living-wage threshold does not mean that every worker can close the gap through training alone. Earnings may reflect hourly wages, available hours, seasonal work, multiple-job holding, career stage, or structural wage ceilings within an occupation or industry. Leaders should investigate which workers have realistic advancement pathways and whether the most effective intervention is training, job-quality improvement, career navigation, employer practice change, or movement into a different occupation.
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How are Hawaiʻi Island workers distributed relative to a living wage?
What the evidence tells us
A modeled $1.75 million annual investment that helps 875 Hawaiʻi Island workers each year move into higher-wage roles could generate more than $300 million in cumulative additional earnings by 2036. When those earnings circulate through the local economy, the model estimates nearly $500 million in total additional economic activity over the same period. The gains grow over time as successive groups of workers advance and continue earning more, illustrating how sustained workforce investment could benefit workers, families, employers, and the broader regional economy.
What to keep in mind
These figures are modeled scenarios rather than forecasts or observed program results. They depend on assumptions about the number of workers served, the size and duration of their earnings gains, continued annual investment, the availability of higher-wage jobs, and how much additional income remains and recirculates locally. The projections show the potential scale of impact, while actual results would need to be measured through longitudinal worker and wage data.
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What is the cumulative earnings impact of sustained workforce investment in Hawaiʻi County?
What is the total local economic impact of sustained workforce investment in Hawaiʻi County?
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi County needs a coordinated combination of all three. The county is projected to have far fewer living-wage openings than people entering the workforce, so training alone cannot solve the opportunity gap without growth in the number and quality of available jobs. At the same time, many living-wage occupations require education, credentials, or workplace preparation beyond high school, and thousands of current workers are already close enough to the living-wage threshold that targeted advancement and job-quality improvements could make a meaningful difference. Effective strategy should therefore connect education and training to employer growth, wage progression, reliable hours, career advancement, and the creation of durable destination jobs.
What to keep in mind
The appropriate balance will differ by industry, occupation, employer, and community. Some shortages may require new training capacity, while others may reflect wages, schedules, working conditions, housing, transportation, or limited advancement opportunities. Leaders should diagnose the specific barrier before funding a solution and avoid assuming that every employer hiring challenge represents a worker skills gap.
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What the evidence tells us
Before investing, leaders should verify that a proposed pathway connects to enough real, accessible, living-wage destination jobs to matter at regional scale. That means testing employer demand, wages and job quality, STAR access, education and credential requirements, advancement potential, training capacity, and where opportunities are located across the island. Leaders should also determine whether the primary constraint is a shortage of trained workers, limited job quality, insufficient employer capacity, weak career navigation, or too few destination jobs. The strongest pathways will align worker opportunity, employer need, and regional economic development rather than addressing only one part of the system.
What to keep in mind
County-level data can identify promising signals, but it cannot confirm that a specific program, credential, or employer partnership will succeed. Leaders should validate the evidence with employers, workers, learners, educators, and community organizations; examine the occupations beneath broad industry categories; and establish clear measures for participation, completion, employment, wages, retention, and advancement before scaling an investment.
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Honolulu County

What the evidence tells us
Honolulu is projected to have approximately 116,100 people enter its workforce between 2022 and 2032, compared with about 71,500 projected living-wage job openings. Those openings are equivalent to roughly 62% of future workforce entrants—the strongest share among Hawaiʻi’s counties, but still a shortfall of approximately 44,600 living-wage opportunities. Honolulu’s larger and more diverse economy provides a stronger foundation for mobility, yet continued job creation, wage growth, job-quality improvement, and broader access to existing opportunities will still be necessary to meet the needs of its future workforce.
What to keep in mind
This comparison measures the overall scale of opportunity rather than predicting that exactly 62% of entrants will obtain living-wage jobs. Workers may move between counties, compete with current workers for openings, change jobs more than once, or enter occupations that grow differently than projected. The figures also do not capture future wage increases, new industries, or economic-development efforts that could create additional living-wage opportunities.
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- How does the number of workers entering Honolulu’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
What the evidence tells us
Honolulu’s labor market offers more jobs and a wider range of industries and occupations than any other county in Hawaiʻi, but scale alone does not ensure that residents can access work that provides economic security. Projected living-wage openings are equivalent to only about 62% of the people expected to enter Honolulu’s workforce, and many available jobs pay below the county’s living-wage threshold. Residents may also face mismatches involving education, experience, credentials, schedules, transportation, job location, or the availability of clear pathways into higher-paying roles. A strong workforce strategy must therefore improve access to existing opportunities while also increasing wages, job quality, and advancement within the broader labor market.
What to keep in mind
County-level data reveal the overall structure of opportunity but cannot explain why a particular resident cannot access a particular job. Understanding those barriers requires engagement with workers and employers, along with more detailed information about occupations, wages, hours, benefits, hiring requirements, career progression, and where jobs are located across Oʻahu.
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What the evidence tells us
Honolulu’s living-wage opportunities span a broad range of education and training pathways. Many typically require a bachelor’s degree, while others are accessible through associate degrees, postsecondary certificates, apprenticeships, occupational licenses, substantial workplace training, or experience gained over time. Honolulu’s larger and more diverse economy therefore supports multiple routes into economic security, but residents need clear information about which credentials and experiences connect to actual local openings and advancement opportunities.
What to keep in mind
The education level typically associated with an occupation does not describe every employer’s hiring requirements or every worker’s route into the field. Completing a credential also does not guarantee access to a living-wage job. Pathways must align with employer demand, wages, job quality, geographic access, career progression, and the practical supports residents need to complete training and move into employment.
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What education levels are required for living-wage job openings in Honolulu?
Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings in Honolulu, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Business and Management accounts for approximately 30% of Honolulu’s projected living-wage openings between 2022 and 2032, followed by Construction and Repair at 17% and Healthcare at 13%. Together, these three groups represent about 60% of projected living-wage opportunities. Honolulu also has meaningful opportunities across a broader range of fields—including Engineering and Technology, Arts and Entertainment, Legal, and Natural and Social Sciences—giving residents and pathway planners several potential destinations around which to organize career navigation, education, training, and employer partnerships.
What to keep in mind
Broad occupation groups contain jobs with very different wages, entry requirements, working conditions, and advancement prospects. Some Business and Management roles may require significant prior experience or higher education, while Construction, Healthcare, and technical careers may depend on apprenticeships, licenses, credentials, or specialized training. Leaders should examine the specific occupations and employers beneath each category before deciding which pathways can provide accessible opportunities at meaningful scale.
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- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings in Honolulu, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services stands out as Honolulu’s clearest Anchor industry, combining substantial STAR hiring volume with comparatively favorable wage and mobility conditions. Information and Technology and Construction are classified as Building industries: they do not yet meet every condition associated with an Anchor, but their scale and emerging opportunity indicators suggest strong potential for targeted pathway development. Real Estate and Transportation and Warehousing offer more uneven opportunity, while high-volume industries such as Healthcare and Professional Services remain Limited because access to jobs does not consistently translate into living-wage earnings or advancement.
What to keep in mind
Industry classifications describe broad patterns rather than every occupation or employer. A Building industry may still include inaccessible or low-quality jobs, while a Limited industry may contain specific employers or occupations offering strong pathways. Leaders should look beneath the industry level at wages, degree requirements, turnover, working conditions, advancement routes, and the number of durable destination jobs before investing.
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- Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Honolulu industries?
What the evidence tells us
Among Honolulu’s approximately 433,500 STAR workers, about 80,350 earn within $20,000 of the county’s living-wage threshold. This includes roughly 35,570 workers within $10,000 of the threshold and another 44,790 earning between $10,000 and $20,000 below it. Nearly one in five Honolulu STAR workers may therefore represent an important opportunity for targeted wage growth, skills recognition, career advancement, more consistent hours, or movement into better-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
Being relatively close to the living-wage threshold does not mean every worker can close the gap through training alone. Earnings may reflect hourly wages, available hours, multiple-job holding, career stage, or structural wage ceilings within an occupation or industry. Honolulu’s large addressable workforce also spans many different industries and communities, so effective strategies will likely require multiple approaches rather than a single advancement program.
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- How are Honolulu workers distributed relative to a living wage?
What the evidence tells us
A modeled $7.1 million annual investment supporting approximately 3,557 Honolulu workers each year in moving into higher-wage roles could generate nearly $1.5 billion in cumulative additional earnings by 2036. Applying a 1.4-times local economic multiplier, those earnings could produce approximately $2 billion in additional economic activity as workers spend more within the local economy. The gains accumulate as successive groups of workers advance and continue earning more, showing how sustained investment could benefit workers and families while also strengthening employers, businesses, and Honolulu’s broader economy.
What to keep in mind
These figures are modeled scenarios rather than forecasts or observed program results. They depend on assumptions about the number of workers served, the cost and effectiveness of workforce interventions, the size and duration of earnings gains, the availability of higher-wage destination jobs, and how much additional income recirculates locally. Actual returns would need to be measured through longitudinal employment and wage data.
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- What is the cumulative earnings impact of sustained workforce investment in Honolulu?
- What is the total local economic impact of sustained workforce investment in Honolulu?
What the evidence tells us
Honolulu’s labor market has enough scale and variety to support a portfolio of mobility strategies rather than relying on a single industry or occupation group. Administrative and Support Services provides a strong Anchor opportunity, while Information and Technology and Construction show potential for further pathway development. At the same time, projected living-wage openings extend across Business and Management, Healthcare, Engineering and Technology, and several other occupational fields. Honolulu also has more than 80,000 STAR workers earning within $20,000 of a living wage, creating opportunities for different combinations of incumbent-worker advancement, career transitions, credential attainment, skills recognition, and movement into higher-quality jobs.
What to keep in mind
A larger labor market does not automatically produce a coordinated system of pathways. Each strategy still needs clear destination jobs, committed employers, accessible education and training, effective career navigation, and measures of wages and advancement. Leaders should also distinguish between pathways capable of reaching large numbers of residents and more specialized opportunities that may be valuable at a smaller scale. A portfolio approach works best when the pathways complement one another and collectively serve workers with different skills, experiences, and starting points.
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What the evidence tells us
Honolulu’s strongest candidates for large-scale pathway development are concentrated in fields with both substantial living-wage opportunity and meaningful employer demand. Business and Management accounts for about 30% of projected living-wage openings, followed by Construction and Repair at 17% and Healthcare at 13%. Administrative and Support Services also stands out as a strong STAR mobility industry, while Construction and Information and Technology show potential for further pathway development. Together, these fields may support broad strategies serving large numbers of residents, while smaller occupational areas such as Engineering and Technology, Legal, Arts and Entertainment, and Natural and Social Sciences may be better suited to more specialized investments.
What to keep in mind
Industry and occupation size alone do not establish that a pathway is ready to scale. Leaders should verify that the specific jobs beneath these broad categories offer living wages, accessible entry points, advancement opportunities, committed employers, and enough education or training capacity to serve workers effectively. Smaller pathways may still be strategically important when they provide strong outcomes for a particular population, neighborhood, or employer need.
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What the evidence tells us
Honolulu can translate its large and diverse labor market into broader opportunity by connecting residents more clearly to the jobs, credentials, employers, and advancement routes that already exist. That requires coordinated career navigation, paid work experience, accessible education and training, skills recognition, employer partnerships, and stronger transitions between entry-level work and living-wage destination jobs. It also requires attention to job quality and practical barriers such as transportation, scheduling, childcare, and the cost and time required to complete a credential. With living-wage openings spread across several occupation groups and more than 80,000 STAR workers already within $20,000 of the living-wage threshold, Honolulu has the scale to build multiple pathways serving residents with different skills, experiences, and starting points.
What to keep in mind
Access barriers will differ across occupations, employers, neighborhoods, and populations. County-level evidence can show where opportunity may exist, but it cannot determine whether residents know about a pathway, can afford or reach the training, meet hiring requirements, or sustain employment under the available wages and working conditions. Effective pathway design should therefore combine labor-market evidence with direct input from workers, learners, employers, educators, and community organizations.
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Kauaʻi County

What the evidence tells us
Kauaʻi is projected to have approximately 9,300 people enter its workforce between 2022 and 2032, compared with about 2,700 projected living-wage job openings. Those openings are equivalent to roughly 29% of future workforce entrants. This points to an important opportunity for Kauaʻi to expand the number of jobs that provide economic security, raise wages and job quality within existing occupations, and strengthen residents’ access to the living-wage pathways already present across the island.
What to keep in mind
This comparison describes the overall relationship between projected entrants and openings rather than predicting how many individual residents will secure living-wage work. Workers may move between counties, compete with current workers for openings, change jobs more than once, or enter occupations that grow differently than projected. Future business development, wage increases, entrepreneurship, remote work, and new economic opportunities could also change the number and range of living-wage jobs available.
Explore the evidence
- How does the number of workers entering Kauaʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
What the evidence tells us
Employer hiring challenges and resident opportunity challenges can exist at the same time because the issue is not simply the number of workers or available jobs. Kauaʻi is projected to have substantially fewer living-wage openings than people entering the workforce, while individual positions may require specific combinations of education, credentials, experience, schedules, transportation, and geographic access. Employers may therefore have difficulty filling particular roles even as residents struggle to find work that is stable, well-matched to their skills, and sufficient to support their families. Addressing this mismatch requires stronger connections among job quality, career navigation, education and training, and employer hiring practices.
What to keep in mind
County-level evidence shows the overall structure of the labor market but does not directly explain why a particular vacancy remains unfilled. Employer and worker engagement is still needed to understand factors such as wages, benefits, scheduling, housing, transportation, childcare, credential requirements, seasonal employment, and advancement opportunities. Those conversations can help distinguish when the most useful response is training, better job quality, stronger recruitment and navigation, or a redesigned pathway into the work.
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What the evidence tells us
Kauaʻi’s living-wage opportunities span several education and training pathways. Many typically require preparation beyond high school, including bachelor’s or associate degrees, postsecondary certificates, occupational licenses, apprenticeships, substantial workplace training, or experience developed over time. This creates an opportunity to build a connected range of pathways—rather than relying on one credential model—that helps residents translate different forms of learning and experience into economically secure careers.
What to keep in mind
The education level typically associated with an occupation does not describe every employer’s hiring requirements or every worker’s route into the field. A credential is most valuable when it connects to real local openings, strong wages, job quality, and continued advancement. Pathway design should also account for the time, cost, travel, scheduling, and other practical supports residents may need to complete training and move into employment.
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- What education levels are required for living-wage job openings on Kauaʻi?
- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings on Kauaʻi, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Business and Management and Construction and Repair are each projected to account for approximately 33% of Kauaʻi’s living-wage job openings between 2022 and 2032. Together, they represent about two-thirds of the island’s projected living-wage opportunity. Healthcare, Protective Service, Administrative, and Cleaning and Maintenance occupations account for most of the remaining openings. These fields provide clear starting points for career navigation, apprenticeships, technical education, employer partnerships, and incumbent-worker advancement.
What to keep in mind
Broad occupation groups contain jobs with different wages, entry requirements, working conditions, and advancement prospects. Business and Management roles may require prior experience, supervisory responsibility, professional networks, or higher education, while Construction and Repair may offer routes through apprenticeships, licensing, technical preparation, and workplace learning. Leaders should examine the specific occupations and employers beneath each category while strengthening complementary pathways that expand the range of options available to residents.
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- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings on Kauaʻi, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services stands out as Kauaʻi’s clearest Anchor industry, with 1,116 STAR-accessible postings and a comparatively strong combination of hiring demand, wages, access, and mobility potential. Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction are classified as Building industries, together accounting for another 1,085 postings. Healthcare and Professional Services are especially notable because their opportunity conditions appear stronger on Kauaʻi than they do in the statewide analysis, creating promising foundations for locally designed advancement pathways. Real Estate and Transportation and Warehousing also provide meaningful STAR access, although their wages or mobility conditions appear more uneven.
What to keep in mind
Industry classifications describe broad patterns rather than every occupation or employer. An Anchor or Building industry may still include jobs with low wages, limited hours, or significant credential requirements, while a Partial industry may contain specific employers offering strong advancement. Leaders should examine the occupations beneath each category, confirm the availability of durable living-wage destination jobs, and engage workers and employers before deciding where pathway investment would have the greatest impact.
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- Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Kauaʻi industries?
What the evidence tells us
Among Kauaʻi’s approximately 37,000 STAR workers, about 6,916 earn within $20,000 of the county’s living-wage threshold. This includes roughly 3,012 workers within $10,000 of the threshold and another 3,904 earning between $10,000 and $20,000 below it. Nearly one in five Kauaʻi STAR workers may therefore represent an important opportunity for targeted wage growth, more consistent hours, skills recognition, supervisory advancement, or movement into better-paying roles. Another 11,421 STAR workers already earn above the living-wage threshold, offering an opportunity to learn which occupations, employers, and pathways are producing strong outcomes.
What to keep in mind
Being relatively close to the living-wage threshold does not mean every worker can close the gap through training alone. Earnings may reflect hourly wages, available hours, seasonal employment, multiple-job holding, career stage, or structural wage ceilings within an occupation or industry. Leaders should determine which workers have realistic advancement opportunities and whether the most effective intervention is training, wage growth, job-quality improvement, career navigation, or movement into a different role.
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- How are Kauaʻi workers distributed relative to a living wage?
What the evidence tells us
A modeled $600,000 annual investment helping approximately 301 Kauaʻi workers each year move into higher-wage roles could generate about $120 million in cumulative additional earnings by 2036. Applying a 1.4-times local economic multiplier, those earnings could support approximately $165 million in additional economic activity as workers spend more with local businesses and service providers. The gains build over time as each new group of workers advances while earlier participants continue earning and spending more, showing how focused, sustained investment could produce meaningful benefits for households, employers, and communities across Kauaʻi.
What to keep in mind
These figures are modeled scenarios rather than forecasts or observed program results. They depend on assumptions about worker participation, successful movement into higher-wage roles, the duration of earnings gains, the availability of destination jobs, and how much additional spending remains and recirculates on Kauaʻi. Actual impact would need to be measured through longitudinal employment and wage data, while complementary economic-development strategies could help more of the resulting benefit remain within the local economy.
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- What is the cumulative earnings impact of sustained workforce investment in Kauaʻi County?
- What is the total local economic impact of sustained workforce investment in Kauaʻi County?
What the evidence tells us
Kauaʻi can build connected pathways by organizing partners around the occupations and industries where living-wage opportunity, employer demand, and STAR access appear most aligned. Education providers can connect career awareness and training to specific destination jobs; employers can clarify skills, provide paid work experience, participate in hiring, and create advancement routes; and workforce partners can help residents navigate transitions among education, employment, and continued learning. Shared priorities across Business and Management, Construction and Repair, Healthcare, Administrative and Support Services, and other promising fields could support a coordinated portfolio of pathways rather than isolated programs.
What to keep in mind
Labor-market evidence can identify where alignment may be possible, but it does not show whether the necessary relationships, training capacity, employer commitments, or participant supports are already in place. Partners should map existing programs, identify gaps and duplication, agree on shared outcomes, and clarify who will coordinate recruitment, navigation, work-based learning, data collection, and continuous improvement. Successful coordination also requires listening to workers and learners so that pathways address practical barriers such as cost, scheduling, transportation, and access to training.
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What the evidence tells us
Kauaʻi should concentrate investment where several conditions come together: meaningful employer demand, accessible entry points for STAR workers, living-wage or advancement potential, committed partners, and enough opportunity to benefit residents at useful scale. Current evidence points to Administrative and Support Services as a strong Anchor opportunity, with Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction offering promising foundations for further pathway development. Business and Management and Construction and Repair also account for a substantial share of projected living-wage openings. A balanced portfolio could therefore strengthen established opportunities while building additional pathways in fields where local conditions appear favorable.
What to keep in mind
Promising labor-market signals do not automatically identify which program or investment will produce the greatest return. Leaders should examine the specific occupations, employers, wages, working conditions, training requirements, and advancement routes beneath each industry. Readiness also matters: a pathway with committed employers, accessible training, effective navigation, and clear destination jobs may warrant earlier investment than an industry with promising data but limited implementation capacity. Smaller or more specialized pathways may still be valuable when they address an important community need or create strong outcomes for a particular population.
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What the evidence tells us
Kauaʻi can pursue both goals by improving job quality, advancement, and access within industries that already employ many residents while also developing pathways in fields with promising demand and mobility potential. Administrative and Support Services provides a strong existing foundation, while Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction show potential for further growth and pathway development. Business and Management and Construction and Repair also account for a substantial share of projected living-wage openings. Coordinating workforce investment with employer growth, entrepreneurship, infrastructure, and economic-development efforts can help established industries produce better outcomes while creating additional sources of living-wage opportunity.
What to keep in mind
Expanding opportunity does not require abandoning the industries that already support Kauaʻi’s economy, nor does every emerging field warrant major investment. Leaders should test whether specific industries can provide accessible entry points, durable demand, living wages, advancement, and meaningful opportunities for local residents. Diversification efforts are strongest when they build from Kauaʻi’s existing assets and relationships while reducing dependence on any single source of employment.
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What the evidence tells us
Shared workforce infrastructure can help Kauaʻi connect residents to opportunity across multiple industries without requiring every employer, school, or program to build a separate system. Common career-navigation tools, coordinated employer engagement, paid work-based learning, shared recruitment and participant support, and intermediary capacity can make pathways easier to find and use. Shared infrastructure can also help education and workforce partners align training with actual destination jobs, support employers that may not have the capacity to operate programs independently, and create consistent transitions from career awareness to training, hiring, and advancement.
What to keep in mind
Shared infrastructure should support local relationships rather than replace them with a centralized or one-size-fits-all model. Partners will still need clear roles, sustainable funding, trusted coordination, and shared measures of participation, employment, wages, retention, and advancement. The design should also remain flexible enough to serve different industries, communities, and worker populations while addressing practical barriers such as scheduling, transportation, program cost, and access to paid experience.
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What the evidence tells us
Before investing, Kauaʻi leaders should verify that a proposed pathway connects residents to enough real, accessible, living-wage destination jobs to justify the effort. That means examining the specific occupations and employers beneath broad industry signals; confirming wages, job quality, hiring demand, entry requirements, and advancement routes; and assessing whether education and training providers have the capacity to support the pathway. Leaders should also identify whether the primary opportunity involves preparing new workers, helping incumbent workers advance, improving employer practices, or strengthening coordination among existing programs.
What to keep in mind
County-level evidence can identify promising areas, but it cannot determine whether a specific credential, employer partnership, or training model is ready to scale. Leaders should validate the signal with workers, learners, employers, educators, and community organizations and examine barriers such as cost, scheduling, transportation, paid work experience, childcare, and access to training. Clear measures of participation, completion, employment, wages, retention, and advancement should be established before expanding an investment.
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Maui County

What the evidence tells us
Maui County is projected to have approximately 20,000 people enter its workforce between 2022 and 2032, compared with about 9,000 projected living-wage job openings. Those openings are equivalent to roughly 45% of future workforce entrants. This indicates that Maui County will need a combination of additional living-wage job creation, stronger wages and job quality within existing occupations, and clearer pathways connecting residents to the opportunities already available across the county.
What to keep in mind
This comparison describes the overall relationship between projected entrants and living-wage openings rather than predicting how many individual residents will secure living-wage work. Workers may move between counties, compete with current workers for openings, change jobs more than once, or enter occupations that grow differently than projected. Future wage increases, business development, entrepreneurship, remote work, and economic-recovery or diversification efforts could also change the number and range of living-wage opportunities available across Maui County.
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- How does the number of workers entering Maui County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
What the evidence tells us
Employer hiring challenges and resident opportunity challenges can exist at the same time because the issue is not simply the number of workers or job openings. Maui County is projected to have fewer living-wage openings than people entering the workforce, while individual jobs may require specific combinations of education, credentials, experience, schedules, and geographic access. Employers may therefore struggle to fill particular positions even as residents have difficulty finding work that is stable, well-matched to their skills, and sufficient to support their households. Addressing this mismatch requires attention to job quality, career navigation, education and training, and employer hiring practices alongside recruitment.
What to keep in mind
Countywide evidence reveals the overall structure of the labor market but does not directly explain why a particular position remains vacant. Employer and worker engagement is still needed to understand factors such as wages, benefits, scheduling, housing, transportation, childcare, credential requirements, seasonal employment, and advancement opportunities. These barriers may also differ across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi, making locally grounded interpretation especially important.
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What the evidence tells us
Maui County’s living-wage opportunities span multiple education and training pathways. Many typically require preparation beyond high school, including bachelor’s or associate degrees, postsecondary certificates, occupational licenses, apprenticeships, substantial workplace training, or experience developed over time. This creates an opportunity to build a connected range of routes into economic security that recognizes both formal credentials and skills gained through work, military service, and other forms of applied learning.
What to keep in mind
The education level typically associated with an occupation does not describe every employer’s hiring requirements or every worker’s route into the field. A credential is most valuable when it connects to real local openings, strong wages, job quality, and continued advancement. Pathway design should also account for the time, cost, scheduling, transportation, digital access, and geographic realities residents may face when accessing training across Maui County, including on Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi.
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- What education levels are required for living-wage job openings on Maui?
- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings on Maui, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Business and Management is projected to account for approximately 37% of Maui County’s living-wage job openings between 2022 and 2032, followed by Construction and Repair at 19%, Healthcare at 12%, and Administrative occupations at 7%. Together, these four groups represent about three-quarters of projected living-wage opportunities. They provide important starting points for career navigation, education and training alignment, apprenticeships, employer partnerships, and incumbent-worker advancement across Maui County.
What to keep in mind
Broad occupation groups include jobs with different wages, entry requirements, working conditions, and advancement prospects. Business and Management positions may require prior experience or higher education, while Construction, Healthcare, and Administrative pathways may depend on apprenticeships, licenses, credentials, or workplace learning. The countywide data also do not show how opportunities are distributed among Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi, so leaders should examine specific occupations, employers, and locations before designing or expanding pathways.
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- Which occupation groups are projected to generate the most living-wage job openings in Maui County, 2022–2032?
What the evidence tells us
Maui County’s strongest near-term opportunities appear in Hospitality and Healthcare, which combine substantial STAR hiring demand with a Building classification. Hospitality accounts for approximately 1,602 STAR-accessible postings and Healthcare for another 1,112, while Construction adds 204. Utilities meets the strongest Anchor conditions but offers far fewer openings, with about 122 postings. Together, these patterns suggest a two-part strategy: strengthen advancement and job quality within high-volume Building industries while preserving targeted pathways into smaller fields that already demonstrate strong wages and mobility conditions.
What to keep in mind
A Building classification signals promising conditions rather than uniformly strong opportunity. Hospitality and Healthcare each contain occupations with very different wages, hours, benefits, credential requirements, and advancement prospects, and high posting volume may partly reflect turnover or persistent vacancies. Leaders should identify which employers and occupations provide durable living-wage pathways and examine whether opportunities and required training are accessible across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi.
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- Where are STAR workers finding job postings across Maui County industries?
What the evidence tells us
Among Maui County’s approximately 81,100 STAR workers, about 14,700 earn within $20,000 of the county’s living-wage threshold. This includes roughly 6,500 workers within $10,000 of the threshold and another 8,200 earning between $10,000 and $20,000 below it. Together, these workers represent about 18% of Maui County’s STAR workforce and may benefit from targeted wage growth, more reliable hours, skills recognition, supervisory advancement, or movement into better-paying roles. Another 27,900 STAR workers already earn above the threshold, creating an opportunity to identify which employers, occupations, and pathways are producing strong outcomes.
What to keep in mind
Being relatively close to the living-wage threshold does not mean every worker can close the gap through training alone. Earnings may reflect hourly wages, available hours, seasonal employment, multiple-job holding, career stage, or structural wage ceilings within an occupation or industry. Some workers may be able to advance within their current field, while others may need job-quality improvements or pathways into occupations with stronger earnings potential. Countywide totals may also conceal important differences across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi.
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- How are Maui County workers distributed relative to a living wage?
What the evidence tells us
A modeled $1.3 million annual investment helping approximately 651 Maui County workers each year move into higher-wage roles could generate about $255 million in cumulative additional earnings by 2036. Applying a 1.4-times local economic multiplier, those earnings could support approximately $360 million in additional economic activity as workers spend more within the countywide economy. The gains build over time as each new group of workers advances while earlier participants continue earning more, showing how sustained investment could benefit households, employers, businesses, and communities across Maui County.
What to keep in mind
These figures are modeled scenarios rather than forecasts or observed program results. They depend on assumptions about worker participation, successful movement into higher-wage roles, the size and duration of earnings gains, the availability of destination jobs, and how much additional income recirculates locally. Actual results may also differ across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi and would need to be measured through longitudinal employment and wage data.
Explore the evidence
- What is the cumulative earnings impact of sustained workforce investment in Maui County?
- What is the total local economic impact of sustained workforce investment in Maui County?
What the evidence tells us
Maui County can expand economic mobility by improving access, job quality, and advancement within industries that already provide substantial employment. Hospitality and Healthcare offer especially broad foundations because they generate significant STAR-accessible demand, while Construction also provides promising routes into living-wage work. Strategies could connect entry-level jobs to progressively higher-paying roles through clearer career maps, skills recognition, paid training, apprenticeships, portable credentials, supervisory development, and employer-supported advancement. Strengthening these pathways could help residents build on their existing experience while helping employers retain and develop local talent.
What to keep in mind
High employment or posting volume does not guarantee strong mobility. Demand may reflect turnover, persistent vacancies, seasonal patterns, or jobs with wages and schedules that make retention difficult. Leaders should identify the specific occupations and employers where advancement is realistic, determine whether workers need additional training or improved job quality, and ensure that pathways lead to durable living-wage destinations. Opportunities and barriers may also differ across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi.
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What the evidence tells us
Workforce strategy can support resilience by strengthening advancement and job quality within industries that already employ many Maui County residents while also building pathways into fields that broaden the county’s living-wage opportunities. Hospitality and Healthcare provide substantial STAR-accessible demand, Construction offers additional mobility potential, and Utilities demonstrates strong wage and access conditions at a more targeted scale. Investments in transferable skills, career navigation, entrepreneurship, paid work experience, and employer-connected education can help residents move across occupations as economic conditions change. Coordinating these efforts with business development, infrastructure, and regional economic priorities can help workforce preparation and the creation of durable destination jobs advance together.
What to keep in mind
Diversification should not mean pursuing industries simply because they are growing elsewhere or treating established sectors as obstacles to resilience. Proposed pathways should reflect Maui County’s employers, community priorities, geographic realities, wages, advancement opportunities, and capacity to create jobs at meaningful scale. Strategies should also account for differences across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi and test whether residents can realistically access the training, capital, technology, transportation, and employer networks required to benefit.
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What the evidence tells us
Accessible pathways in Maui County will likely require flexible and distributed delivery rather than relying on a single training site or service model. Residents’ ability to participate can depend on where training and employers are located, transportation options, work and caregiving schedules, digital connectivity, and the cost and reliability of interisland travel. Workforce partners can respond through hybrid instruction, rotating or community-based cohorts, employer-hosted training, paid work-based learning, shared equipment and instructors, and coordinated navigation that helps residents understand which steps can be completed locally and which require travel. These approaches can expand access while keeping pathways connected to real living-wage opportunities.
What to keep in mind
Flexibility should not come at the expense of training quality, employer relevance, or worker support. Online delivery may reduce travel but can create new barriers when broadband, devices, hands-on instruction, or quiet learning space are limited. Leaders should design pathways with residents and employers from Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi and examine participation, completion, placement, and wage outcomes by community to determine who is being reached and where additional support is needed.
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What the evidence tells us
Shared workforce infrastructure can make career pathways easier to navigate, less costly to operate, and more accessible across industries and communities. Common career-navigation tools can help residents understand available occupations, training requirements, wages, and next steps. Coordinated employer engagement can reduce duplication and create a clearer way for businesses to offer paid work experience, identify skill needs, and participate in training design. Shared participant supports, instructors, facilities, data systems, and intermediary capacity can also allow multiple industries and communities to benefit from investments that may be difficult for any single employer or training provider to sustain alone.
What to keep in mind
Shared infrastructure is most useful when roles, funding, governance, and accountability are clear. A countywide system should still leave room for different approaches across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi and should not require residents or small employers to navigate an overly centralized structure. Leaders should test whether shared services reduce barriers, strengthen employer participation, improve pathway completion, and connect residents to better wages and advancement.
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What the evidence tells us
Before scaling a pathway, Maui County leaders should confirm that it leads to real, durable opportunity. That means identifying the specific occupations and employers involved; validating current and expected hiring demand; examining wages, hours, benefits, and advancement potential; clarifying entry requirements; and assessing whether local training providers can deliver the necessary education, credentials, or work-based learning. Leaders should also test whether residents can realistically access the pathway across Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi and whether employers are prepared to hire, support, and advance participants.
What to keep in mind
Strong countywide signals are a starting point, not a substitute for local validation. Posting volume may reflect turnover, projected openings may not materialize as expected, and a training program can succeed academically without producing better employment outcomes. Leaders should engage workers, employers, educators, and community partners early, pilot before scaling, and track participation, completion, placement, retention, wage growth, and advancement by community. The strongest investments will combine labor-market evidence with direct knowledge of worker barriers, employer practices, and local delivery capacity.
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FAQ by Stakeholder

Employers

What the evidence tells us
They may be. Nearly two-thirds of Hawaiʻi’s workforce is Skilled Through Alternative Routes, yet many living-wage roles still use a four-year degree as an initial screening requirement. When a degree is preferred rather than truly necessary for the work, employers may exclude experienced candidates who developed relevant skills through employment, community college, apprenticeships, military service, or other pathways.
What to keep in mind
Skills-based hiring does not mean lowering standards. Employers can identify the capabilities a role genuinely requires and use work experience, assessments, credentials, and demonstrated performance to evaluate candidates more directly.
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- What share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce consists of STARs versus four-year degree holders?
- What education levels are typically required to access projected living-wage jobs?
What the evidence tells us
It may be both. Hawaiʻi faces genuine shortages in some occupations, but the state is also projected to create far more openings than living-wage opportunities. Employers may struggle to recruit or retain workers when jobs offer low wages, unstable hours, limited advancement, or requirements that exclude otherwise qualified candidates. Persistent vacancies can therefore signal unmet demand, job-quality challenges, or a mismatch between the role and the available workforce.
What to keep in mind
Statewide and industry data can identify patterns, but each employer must examine its own wages, turnover, applicant pool, scheduling, credential requirements, and advancement outcomes to understand what is driving its vacancies.
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What the evidence tells us
STARs make up the majority of the workforce in every county: about 68% on Hawaiʻi Island, 61% in Honolulu, 69% on Kauaʻi, and 69% in Maui County. That means most employers are already hiring from a talent pool shaped by community college, certificates, military service, apprenticeships, employer training, work experience, and other pathways outside a four-year degree.
What to keep in mind
These estimates describe workers age 25 and older with earnings. They show the scale of the available talent pool, but employers still need to identify which skills and experiences are relevant to particular roles.
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What the evidence tells us
The strongest opportunities differ by county. Administrative and Support Services stands out statewide, while Hawaiʻi Island shows particular strength in Healthcare and promise in Information and Technology, Utilities, and Management. Honolulu shows opportunity in Information and Technology and Construction; Kauaʻi in Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction; and Maui County in Hospitality, Healthcare, and Construction. These industries combine meaningful STAR access with stronger wages or advancement potential.
What to keep in mind
An industry classification is a starting point, not a guarantee that every occupation or employer offers a living-wage pathway. Employers should examine the specific roles, wages, advancement steps, and hiring requirements within their local industry.
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What the evidence tells us
High hiring volume can reflect several different conditions. It may signal industry growth and expanding opportunity, but it can also result from repeated vacancies, seasonal demand, hard-to-fill positions, or persistent turnover. Season One shows that some industries post frequently while offering uneven wages or limited momentum, so posting volume alone does not establish that an industry provides strong economic mobility.
What to keep in mind
Employers should interpret hiring volume alongside wage levels, changes in demand, retention, advancement opportunities, and the share of roles accessible to STAR workers. Job postings measure recruitment activity and may not represent unique positions or successful hires.
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Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Hawaiʻi industries?
Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Hawaiʻi Island industries?
Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Honolulu industries?
Where are STAR job postings concentrated across Kauaʻi industries?
Where are STAR workers finding job postings across Maui County industries?
What the evidence tells us
Season One identifies approximately 8,750 STAR workers on Hawaiʻi Island, 35,566 in Honolulu, 3,012 on Kauaʻi, and 6,509 in Maui County whose annual earnings fall within $10,000 of the county living-wage threshold. These workers may represent a significant near-term opportunity for wage increases, additional hours, promotions, or movement into higher-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
The data shows the size of the earnings gap, but not which workers are ready to advance or what would help them do so. It does not identify their employers, occupations, hours worked, skills, or access to suitable opportunities.
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What the evidence tells us
In some cases, yes. Hawaiʻi already has a large STAR workforce, including more than 53,000 STAR workers statewide earning within $10,000 of their county’s living-wage threshold. Where employers face recurring demand for higher-skilled roles, advancing experienced workers may be faster and more reliable than competing for a limited external talent pool—especially when those workers already understand the organization, industry, and local community.
What to keep in mind
Advancement does not eliminate the need to recruit. Employers must also plan for the positions workers leave behind, provide paid training and clear promotion pathways, and verify that higher-level roles offer meaningful wage gains and sustained demand.
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What the evidence tells us
Employers would need to become active partners in creating enough paid, high-quality placements to serve a meaningful share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce entrants. Reaching 17,000 annual opportunities would require employers across industries and regions to host learners, provide structured supervision and meaningful work, and connect placements to real career pathways. Employer participation would need to grow alongside intermediary capacity to recruit learners, coordinate placements, support supervisors, and maintain quality.
What to keep in mind
Employers cannot finance or coordinate the entire system alone. Public agencies, educators, intermediaries, and philanthropy may need to share wage and infrastructure costs, especially so smaller employers can participate.
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Educators and training providers

What the evidence tells us
No. College remains an important pathway, but only 43% of Hawaiʻi’s four-year graduates are working in jobs that typically require a degree within five years, and most UH four-year programs shown do not reach a living wage by year five. At the same time, projected living-wage openings are sufficient for only about 59% of Hawaiʻi’s incoming workforce. Producing more graduates without also growing the economy and creating more quality jobs risks deepening underemployment. Hawaiʻi must also help students understand which programs connect to living-wage work so they can make informed choices based on earnings, employer demand, and local opportunity.
What to keep in mind
College provides value beyond earnings, and no student’s future can be predicted from aggregate data. The evidence does suggest that education strategy, career navigation, and economic development must move together so graduates can find work that uses their skills and supports a life in Hawaiʻi.
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What the evidence tells us
Wage outcomes vary substantially across programs. Some UH pathways lead to stronger earnings growth during the first five years after graduation, while others remain below a living wage despite enrolling large numbers of students. The strongest pathways tend to combine clear employer demand, specialized skills, sustained wage progression, and a high share of graduates remaining in Hawaiʻi. This means program size or completion alone is not enough to judge whether a pathway is delivering economic mobility.
What to keep in mind
Season One provides the clearest evidence for UH graduates and does not yet capture every certificate, apprenticeship, employer-based training, or noncredit pathway. Wage outcomes should also be considered alongside completion, access, cost, job availability, and whether graduates can find relevant work locally.
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- How do UH graduate wages change during the first five years after graduation?
- How do graduate wages and program size evolve together? · Which UH programs deliver both strong wages and high resident retention?
What the evidence tells us
Not consistently. Some of Hawaiʻi’s largest UH programs enroll and graduate many students but do not produce median wages above a living-wage threshold within five years. Other, often smaller programs show stronger earnings growth and better alignment with high-wage occupations. Program scale therefore tells us how many learners are being served, but not whether graduates are reaching economic mobility.
What to keep in mind
Wage outcomes vary by field, degree level, location, experience, and whether graduates find work related to their studies. Large programs may also provide broad skills or serve important public purposes, so they should be evaluated using multiple outcomes—not earnings alone.
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What the evidence tells us
A relatively small group of UH programs achieve both outcomes: graduates earn comparatively strong wages and a high share remain employed in Hawaiʻi. These programs are especially valuable because they contribute to individual economic mobility while also retaining skilled workers in the state. Looking at wages and resident retention together can help educators identify pathways that are serving both graduates and Hawaiʻi’s long-term workforce needs.
What to keep in mind
High wages and retention do not automatically mean a program should expand. Program size, student interest, employer demand, cost, completion, and the number of suitable local jobs must also be considered.
Explore the evidence
- Which UH programs deliver both strong wages and high resident retention?
- How do UH graduate wages change during the first five years after graduation? · How do graduate wages and program size evolve together?
What the evidence tells us
Alignment cannot be assumed. Each county has a different mix of industries, employer demand, and living-wage opportunities, and the number of workforce entrants already exceeds available living-wage openings in every county. Education and training providers therefore need to examine whether programs connect to specific local occupations, sufficient hiring demand, and realistic destination jobs—not only whether an industry is growing statewide.
What to keep in mind
Season One does not directly match every education program to county-level job openings. It provides a starting point for identifying where deeper employer validation, occupation-level analysis, and regional pathway planning are needed.
Explore the evidence — Living-wage opportunity: How does the number of workers entering Maui County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Honolulu’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Kauaʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Hawaiʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
Explore the evidence — Regional industries
What the evidence tells us
Not at the scale Hawaiʻi currently projects. Statewide, projected living-wage openings are equivalent to only about 59% of new workforce entrants, with even lower shares in Maui, Hawaiʻi, and Kauaʻi counties. Expanding education and training without confirming that enough relevant, well-paying jobs exist could leave completers competing for too few openings, working below their skill level, or leaving their communities to find opportunity.
What to keep in mind
Season One does not directly compare the number of completers from each program with openings in specific occupations. Educators and training providers still need occupation-level analysis and employer validation to determine whether a pathway connects to sufficient local demand, living-wage work, and realistic employment opportunities.
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What the evidence tells us
The strongest opportunities vary by county. Hawaiʻi Island shows particular strength in Healthcare and promise in Information and Technology, Utilities, and Management. Honolulu shows stronger opportunity in Information and Technology and Construction; Kauaʻi in Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction; and Maui County in Hospitality, Healthcare, and Construction. These patterns can help educators identify where training may align with regional demand and living-wage potential.
What to keep in mind
Industry-level opportunity does not mean every occupation within that industry offers strong wages or advancement. Programs should still examine specific roles, employer demand, hiring requirements, and the number of suitable local openings before expanding.
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What the evidence tells us
Documented access remains limited. Of approximately 17,000 people entering Hawaiʻi’s workforce each year, only 2,067 have known access to paid internships or other high-quality work-based learning opportunities. That represents about 12% of annual entrants—or roughly one in eight—leaving nearly 15,000 without identified access.
What to keep in mind
Hawaiʻi does not yet have a comprehensive system for tracking these opportunities, so some may be missing from the baseline. The data also measures known access, not whether learners participate, complete the experience, or receive the compensation, supervision, and career connection needed for a high-quality pathway.
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What share of Hawaiʻi’s annual workforce entrants has known access to paid internships or high-quality work-based learning opportunities?
What the evidence tells us
A new or expanded program makes the most sense when employers show sustained demand for specific occupations, too few qualified workers, living-wage potential, and enough openings to employ future completers. Where hiring is already high but wages remain low, advancement is limited, or vacancies repeatedly reopen, improving job quality may be more urgent. Where few suitable jobs exist, expanding training could produce more qualified workers than the local economy can employ.
What to keep in mind
Season One can show where deeper investigation is needed, but it cannot confirm a skills shortage on its own. Educators should also examine employer demand, wages, turnover, existing training capacity, completion levels, and the number of relevant local jobs before expanding a pathway.
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Funders and Philanthropy

What the evidence tells us
It depends on how the gap is measured. Proportionally, the gap is greatest in Kauaʻi County, where projected living-wage openings are equivalent to only 29% of workforce entrants, followed by Hawaiʻi County at 34% and Maui County at 45%. In absolute numbers, Honolulu has the largest gap—about 44,600 more projected entrants than living-wage openings—because its workforce is much larger.
What to keep in mind
Percentage gaps reveal where opportunity is most limited relative to population, while absolute gaps show where the greatest number of people may be affected. Funders may need to consider both scale and geographic equity when setting priorities.
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What the evidence tells us
More than 53,000 STAR workers statewide earn within $10,000 of their county’s living-wage threshold: approximately 8,750 on Hawaiʻi Island, 35,566 in Honolulu, 3,012 on Kauaʻi, and 6,509 in Maui County. These workers may represent a significant near-term opportunity for investments that support wage increases, additional hours, promotions, short-term training, or movement into higher-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
The data identifies workers by earnings distance from a living wage, not by occupation, employer, demographic group, skills, or readiness to advance. Funders would need deeper regional and employer-level analysis to determine which interventions could convert that apparent potential into lasting mobility.
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What the evidence tells us
More than 53,000 STAR workers statewide earn within $10,000 of their county’s living-wage threshold: approximately 8,750 on Hawaiʻi Island, 35,566 in Honolulu, 3,012 on Kauaʻi, and 6,509 in Maui County. These workers may represent a significant near-term opportunity for investments that support wage increases, additional hours, promotions, short-term training, or movement into higher-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
The data identifies workers by earnings distance from a living wage, not by occupation, employer, demographic group, skills, or readiness to advance. Funders would need deeper regional and employer-level analysis to determine which interventions could convert that apparent potential into lasting mobility.
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What the evidence tells us
Under the Season One model, Hawaiʻi would need approximately $18.9 million in 2026 to remain on a growth path toward 17,000 annual paid placements, rising to nearly $90 million per year by 2035. That estimate includes direct placement expenses plus a 20% allowance for intermediary infrastructure. By 2035, about $15 million annually would support functions such as employer recruitment, learner preparation, placement matching, supervisor support, troubleshooting, data collection, and quality assurance.
What to keep in mind
The 20% infrastructure allowance is an illustrative planning assumption, not a completed system budget. Hawaiʻi’s geography and reliance on small employers could increase coordination costs, while greater scale and shared systems could create efficiencies.
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What the evidence tells us
Season One’s county models suggest that sustained annual workforce investment could generate more than $2.1 billion in additional cumulative worker earnings by 2036: more than $300 million on Hawaiʻi Island, nearly $1.5 billion in Honolulu, approximately $120 million on Kauaʻi, and about $255 million in Maui County. The gains compound because workers supported in earlier years continue earning more while new cohorts enter higher-paying roles.
What to keep in mind
These are prospective models, not observed outcomes or formal return-on-investment calculations. The results depend on workers completing programs, securing higher-paying employment, sustaining their wage gains, and each county having enough suitable jobs to absorb successive cohorts.
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What the evidence tells us
Higher worker earnings can generate benefits beyond the workers who receive them. When households spend additional income on housing, food, transportation, childcare, and local services, that spending supports business revenue, jobs, and further economic activity. Season One’s county models suggest that sustained workforce investment could therefore produce a local economic impact greater than the initial wage gains alone.
What to keep in mind
The size of the impact depends on how much additional income is spent locally. Housing costs, imported goods, commuting patterns, business ownership, and workers leaving the county can all reduce how much of each dollar continues circulating within the regional economy.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi will likely need both approaches. Honolulu may generate the largest absolute gains because of its scale, while Kauaʻi, Hawaiʻi, and Maui counties face much larger proportional gaps between workforce entrants and living-wage opportunities. A balanced investment strategy could support high-return opportunities where strong pathways already exist while also building capacity in regions where workers have the fewest living-wage options.
What to keep in mind
Maximizing near-term returns and advancing geographic equity are different goals, and they may point to different investments. Funders should be explicit about whether they are seeking scale, demonstration value, regional capacity, or reduced disparities—and assess progress accordingly.
Explore the evidence — Opportunity gaps: How does the number of workers entering Maui County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Honolulu’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Kauaʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? · How does the number of workers entering Hawaiʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
Explore the evidence — Potential returns
What the evidence tells us
Expanding paid pathways requires more than funding individual placements. Hawaiʻi also needs capacity for employer recruitment, learner preparation and navigation, placement matching, supervisor support, quality assurance, data collection, and coordination across education and workforce partners. Season One’s model includes these intermediary functions because they allow multiple programs and employers to participate in a more consistent, effective system.
What to keep in mind
These functions do not all need to be housed in one organization or managed statewide. Funders and partners will need to determine which capacities should be shared, which should be regional, who is accountable for them, and how they will be sustained beyond individual grants.
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What the evidence tells us
Season One reveals important gaps in Hawaiʻi’s workforce intelligence. The state still needs to understand which pathways consistently lead to living-wage employment, how workers progress after training, where jobs are located, how hours and job quality affect earnings, which employers can absorb additional workers, and whether wage gains actually reduce the number of people in low-wage work. Philanthropy can support regional pilots, connected data, worker and employer feedback, and shared learning that help answer these questions before larger investments are made.
What to keep in mind
Research should be tied to real decisions, not treated as an end in itself. The strongest philanthropic investments will help public agencies, employers, educators, and communities test assumptions, improve implementation, and build knowledge that can be used across programs and regions.
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Government, policymakers, and workforce agencies

What the evidence tells us
No. Hawaiʻi is projected to generate about 371,600 job openings between 2022 and 2032, but only about 101,200 are expected to pay a living wage. Compared with approximately 170,500 people projected to enter the workforce, those living-wage openings are equivalent to only about 59% of new entrants. This means workforce policy cannot focus only on preparing more people for work; Hawaiʻi must also increase the number and accessibility of quality jobs.
What to keep in mind
These projections describe the overall scale of opportunity, not whether individual workers can access particular jobs. Educational requirements, geography, experience, transportation, scheduling, and other barriers may further reduce the number of realistic opportunities available to any one person.
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What the evidence tells us
The gap is present statewide, but it is far more severe on the Neighbor Islands. Projected living-wage openings are equivalent to about 62% of workforce entrants in Honolulu, compared with 45% in Maui County, 34% in Hawaiʻi County, and 29% in Kauaʻi County. Honolulu has the largest absolute number of entrants without a corresponding living-wage opening, while Kauaʻi and Hawaiʻi counties face the deepest proportional shortages.
What to keep in mind
County averages can still conceal major differences within islands, industries, and communities. State policy should provide shared goals and infrastructure while allowing regional partners to respond to distinct labor markets, employer needs, and barriers to access.
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What the evidence tells us
In some cases, likely yes. Nearly two-thirds of Hawaiʻi’s workforce is Skilled Through Alternative Routes, while only about 41% of projected living-wage openings are in occupations that typically require a bachelor’s degree. When employers or public systems use four-year degrees as default screens for work that can be performed through experience, certificates, community college, military service, or other pathways, qualified workers may be excluded from living-wage opportunities.
What to keep in mind
Season One does not identify which individual job postings contain unnecessary degree requirements. Policymakers and workforce agencies would need occupation- and employer-level analysis to distinguish roles where a degree is essential from those where skills-based hiring could safely broaden access.
Explore the evidence
- What education levels are required to access living-wage jobs?
- What share of Hawaiʻi’s workforce consists of STARs versus four-year degree holders?
What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services emerges as the strongest recurring statewide opportunity for STAR workers. Regional patterns differ, however. Healthcare is especially promising on Hawaiʻi Island; Honolulu shows strength in Information and Technology and Construction; Kauaʻi combines opportunity in Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction; and Maui shows potential in Hospitality, Healthcare, and Construction. Utilities can also offer strong wages, although the number of available positions is relatively small.
What to keep in mind
These industry-level signals identify where pathway development may be promising, but specific occupations and employers still need to be examined for entry requirements, advancement opportunities, job quality, and sustained demand.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should coordinate the elements that benefit from consistency and shared investment: statewide goals, pathway definitions, quality standards, data systems, measurement, funding alignment, policy, and common tools for navigation and employer engagement. Regions should lead the work that depends on local knowledge and relationships, including identifying priority industries, engaging employers, designing pathways, coordinating learner supports, and adapting implementation to each island’s economic conditions.
What to keep in mind
Statewide infrastructure should make regional action easier without imposing a single model. Clear roles, reliable resources, and meaningful regional decision-making authority will be essential.
Explore the evidence — Shared infrastructure
- How many employers would need to participate for Hawaiʻi to reach 17,000 annual paid pathway opportunities?
- What would the full annual cost of scaling paid pathways look like when intermediary infrastructure is included?
Explore the evidence — Regional differentiation
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi needs a connected foundation that helps people navigate pathways and helps institutions coordinate around them. That includes shared career-navigation tools, consistent standards for high-quality coaching and pathways, strong intermediaries that connect employers with educators and workers, scalable paid work-based learning, and data systems that track participation, employment, retention, and wage progression. Shared infrastructure would allow regions to build locally relevant strategies without recreating the same tools and systems independently.
What to keep in mind
Infrastructure only creates value when people and organizations use it consistently. Hawaiʻi will also need clear stewardship, sustained funding, shared accountability, and enough flexibility for regional partners to adapt statewide tools to local conditions.
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What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi can describe job openings, wages, educational requirements, and broad workforce patterns, but decision-makers still lack a connected view of how people move through pathways and into work. Important gaps include job quality, worksite location, hours worked, pathway participation and completion, employment and retention outcomes, wage progression, resident retention, employer results, barriers to participation, and whether workforce investments actually help more people reach living-wage careers.
What to keep in mind
Better data will only improve decisions when systems are connected, definitions are shared, privacy is protected, and workers, employers, and regional partners help interpret what the numbers mean.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Hawaiʻi should follow workers over time, measuring pathway participation and completion, employment, hours worked, wage growth relative to each county’s living-wage threshold, job retention, advancement into higher-quality roles, and continued residence in Hawaiʻi. Results should also be examined across regions and populations so decision-makers can see who benefits, who is being left behind, and whether gains persist beyond an initial placement.
What to keep in mind
A job placement or short-term wage increase does not necessarily represent lasting mobility. Hawaiʻi should distinguish between gross upward movement and durable net progress, including whether workers remain above a living wage and how advancement affects the jobs they leave behind.
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What the evidence tells us
Workforce investment can help individual workers increase their earnings and move into living-wage careers, but that does not automatically reduce the number of low-wage jobs in Hawaiʻi’s economy. When one worker advances, the position they leave may be filled by someone else. Lasting structural progress therefore requires both stronger pathways for workers and changes that improve wages, hours, job quality, productivity, and advancement within occupations that currently pay below a living wage.
What to keep in mind
Hawaiʻi should measure both individual mobility and system-level change: how many workers advance and remain above a living wage, how many low-wage jobs persist, and whether the total share of workers earning below a living wage declines over time.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
A coordinated strategy would establish a common statewide direction, shared definitions and measures, durable data and pathway infrastructure, aligned public and philanthropic investment, and clear responsibility for results. Regions would then translate that foundation into locally relevant industry priorities, employer partnerships, training pathways, and worker supports. Progress would be reviewed regularly so Hawaiʻi can strengthen what works, adapt what does not, and respond to changing conditions.
What to keep in mind
Statewide coordination should create alignment without imposing uniformity. Success will require clearly defined roles, sustained resources, regional decision-making authority, and accountability for whether workers actually reach and remain in living-wage careers.
Explore the evidence — Shared infrastructure
Explore the evidence — Regional differentiation

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Workers, learners, and families

What the evidence tells us
Yes. About 41% of Hawaiʻi’s projected living-wage job openings typically require a bachelor’s degree, meaning roughly 59% do not. Many workers build valuable skills through community college, certificates, apprenticeships, military service, employer training, and work experience. These alternative routes can lead to strong careers, especially when they connect to occupations with clear advancement opportunities and sustained regional demand.
What to keep in mind
A four-year degree is only one pathway, but many living-wage careers still require specialized training, credentials, licenses, or significant work experience. The strongest route will depend on the occupation, local job market, entry requirements, wages, and opportunities to advance over time.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
The strongest opportunities differ by region. Administrative and Support Services stands out statewide. On Hawaiʻi Island, Healthcare is especially strong, with additional potential in Information and Technology, Utilities, and Management. Honolulu shows promising conditions in Information and Technology and Construction. Kauaʻi combines opportunity in Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction, while Maui shows potential in Hospitality, Healthcare, and Construction.
What to keep in mind
An industry can look promising overall while specific occupations differ in wages, entry requirements, hours, advancement, and hiring demand. These regional signals are a starting point for exploring pathways, rather than a recommendation for any one person or career.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
In this analysis, workers are considered within reach of a living wage when their annual earnings are no more than $10,000 below the living-wage threshold for their county. Workers earning between $10,000 and $20,000 below the threshold are tracked separately. Together, these groups help identify workers who may benefit from targeted wage gains, training, advancement, or job-quality improvements.
What to keep in mind
“Within reach” is an analytical category, not a guarantee that a small wage increase will be easy to achieve. Living-wage thresholds differ by county, and workers’ circumstances, hours, benefits, and pathways to advancement also vary.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
A strong pathway should connect to clearly identified occupations, verified regional hiring demand, and employers that actively help design, deliver, or recruit from the program. Look for paid work experience, transparent entry requirements, recognized credentials, placement and completion results, starting wages, and evidence that participants remain employed and advance over time. Programs should also be able to name the jobs and employers their training is intended to serve.
What to keep in mind
Job postings and employer interest can change, and completing a program does not guarantee employment. Ask for recent outcome data and evidence of sustained employer participation before investing significant time or money.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Among the four-year UH programs included in the available data, Registered Nursing shows the strongest early wage growth, rising above the living-wage threshold by the second year after graduation and reaching about $109,000 by year five. Electrical and Communications Engineering and Civil Engineering also produce comparatively strong five-year wages, at approximately $86,000 and $79,000. Dental Hygiene and some other specialized health and engineering programs also perform relatively well.
What to keep in mind
No program in the analysis reaches a living wage in the first year after graduation, and many remain below it after five years. Wage outcomes also vary by campus, location, graduate cohort, and whether graduates remain employed in Hawaiʻi.
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What the evidence tells us
No. Only about 43% of Hawaiʻi’s four-year graduates work in jobs that typically require a bachelor’s degree within five years of graduation. Wage outcomes also vary widely across programs: some graduates reach a living wage within several years, while many remain below that threshold. A degree can expand opportunity, but outcomes depend on field of study, regional demand, work experience, and the jobs available after graduation.
What to keep in mind
Underemployment does not mean a graduate lacks valuable skills, and earnings alone do not capture every benefit of education. Students and families should consider costs, completion rates, employment outcomes, wages, and resident retention together.
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What the evidence tells us
Available program data identifies approximately 2,067 paid internships or other high-quality work-based learning placements each year—enough to reach roughly 12% of the 17,000 young people entering Hawaiʻi’s workforce annually. Strong programs already exist across the state, but current access remains far below the scale needed for every learner to participate.
What to keep in mind
Hawaiʻi does not yet have a unified statewide system for tracking paid work-based learning, so the true number of placements may be higher. The available estimate reflects known programs and reported participation rather than a comprehensive inventory.
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What the evidence tells us
Each county has a different mix of industries, employers, occupations, wages, and living costs. Honolulu has enough projected living-wage openings for about 62% of new workforce entrants, compared with 45% in Maui County, 34% in Hawaiʻi County, and 29% in Kauaʻi County. The industries offering promising pathways also differ by region, so the same skills or credentials may connect to more opportunities in one county than another.
What to keep in mind
County-level patterns describe the surrounding labor market, not any one person’s prospects. Your opportunities will also depend on occupation, experience, transportation, work arrangements, and whether employers are actively hiring.
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What the evidence tells us
Yes. Gaining skills can improve your qualifications, but it does not create a suitable job where you live. Hawaiʻi’s counties differ in the number and types of living-wage openings available, and some industries offer far stronger pathways in one region than another. A worker may complete training and still face limited local demand, few openings, unsuitable hours, transportation barriers, or jobs that do not pay enough to justify the transition.
What to keep in mind
Training decisions should consider both the skills being gained and the local jobs they are meant to unlock. Ask which employers are hiring, how often suitable positions open, what they pay, and whether remote work, commuting, or relocation would be required.
Explore the evidence

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Regional and economic-development leaders

What the evidence tells us
The strongest opportunities differ by county. On Hawaiʻi Island, Healthcare stands out as an Anchor industry, with emerging potential in Information and Technology, Utilities, and Management. Honolulu shows promising conditions in Administrative and Support Services, Information and Technology, and Construction. Kauaʻi’s opportunities include Administrative and Support Services, Healthcare, Professional Services, and Construction, while Maui shows potential in Administrative and Support Services, Hospitality, Healthcare, and Construction.
What to keep in mind
These classifications identify promising conditions based on STAR access, wages, hiring demand, and momentum. Regional leaders should still examine specific occupations, employers, advancement routes, and the number of living-wage destination jobs before investing in a pathway.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Statewide classifications can mask important regional differences. An industry may offer stronger wages, greater STAR access, more hiring demand, or better advancement opportunities in one county because of its local employers and occupational mix. It may also play a larger role in a smaller regional economy. Healthcare, for example, appears more mixed statewide but emerges as a particularly strong mobility opportunity on Hawaiʻi Island.
What to keep in mind
A promising local classification does not mean every job in the industry is high quality or that enough destination jobs exist to support large-scale training. Regional leaders should verify employer demand, specific occupations, wages, advancement routes, and projected hiring capacity.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Administrative and Support Services stands out as the clearest high-volume industry combining strong STAR access with living-wage potential. Healthcare and Construction can also support mobility, but their strength varies by county and occupation. Other high-volume sectors—particularly Hospitality and lower-wage service industries—may provide substantial access to work without consistently offering wages or advancement that lead to lasting economic mobility.
What to keep in mind
Hiring volume alone does not indicate job quality. Regional leaders should examine wages, hours, turnover, advancement routes, occupational mix, and the number of living-wage destination jobs before treating a high-volume industry as a pathway priority.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Available evidence suggests that destination-job capacity is limited, especially on the Neighbor Islands. Projected living-wage openings are equivalent to about 62% of new workforce entrants in Honolulu, 45% in Maui County, 34% in Hawaiʻi County, and 29% in Kauaʻi County. Large-scale upskilling should therefore focus on occupations where employers can verify sufficient hiring demand, rather than assuming every trained worker will find an appropriate higher-paying job locally.
What to keep in mind
Upskilling can help workers compete for existing opportunities, but it does not create additional destination jobs. Regions may also need employer expansion, job redesign, wage and productivity improvements, and economic diversification to increase the number of living-wage positions available.
Explore the evidence — Regional capacity:How does the number of workers entering Maui County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Honolulu’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Kauaʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Hawaiʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
Explore the evidence — Industry opportunity
What the evidence tells us
Workers whose annual earnings fall within $10,000 of their county’s living-wage threshold are considered closest to reaching a living wage. This group may be especially well positioned to benefit from targeted wage increases, additional hours, advancement into a higher-paying role, or short-term training connected to verified employer demand. The size of this group differs by county because wages, industry mix, and living costs vary across Hawaiʻi.
What to keep in mind
Being close to the threshold does not mean advancement will be simple or equally accessible. Regional leaders should examine occupations, employers, hours, benefits, transportation, and worker circumstances before assuming a particular intervention will close the gap.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Most regions will need a combination. Training is valuable where employers can verify demand for specific skills and occupations. Stronger job quality is necessary in high-volume industries that offer access to work but do not consistently provide sufficient wages, hours, or advancement. Greater industry capacity is especially important where the number of living-wage destination jobs is too limited to absorb everyone who could benefit from upskilling.
What to keep in mind
The right balance will differ by county and industry. Regional strategies should diagnose whether the primary constraint is worker preparation, job quality, insufficient employer demand, or limited destination-job capacity before selecting an intervention.
Explore the evidence — Regional capacity:How does the number of workers entering Maui County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Honolulu’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Kauaʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings? ·How does the number of workers entering Hawaiʻi County’s workforce compare with available living-wage openings?
Explore the evidence — Industry conditions
What the evidence tells us
Local partners are best positioned to engage employers, identify priority industries and occupations, design pathways around regional demand, coordinate learner supports, and adapt implementation to local conditions. Statewide systems can provide the shared foundation: common definitions and quality standards, career-navigation tools, labor-market and outcomes data, funding alignment, policy support, employer-engagement resources, and consistent measures of whether workers advance.
What to keep in mind
Sharing infrastructure statewide should reduce duplication without weakening regional ownership. Clear roles, sustained resources, and meaningful local decision-making authority will be necessary for the two levels to reinforce one another.
Explore the evidence — Shared statewide functions:What share of Hawaiʻi’s annual workforce entrants has known access to paid internships or high-quality work-based learning? ·How many employers would need to participate for Hawaiʻi to reach 17,000 annual paid pathway opportunities? ·What would the full annual cost of scaling paid pathways look like when intermediary infrastructure is included?
Explore the evidence — Locally led functions
What the evidence tells us
Sustained investment that helps workers move into higher-paying jobs could generate substantial cumulative earnings gains in every county. Those added earnings can also support broader local economic activity as households spend more with local businesses and communities retain more income. The scale of potential impact depends on how many workers advance, the size and durability of their wage gains, and whether suitable living-wage jobs are available locally.
What to keep in mind
These estimates describe potential gross economic impact, not guaranteed net growth. Results will depend on whether workers remain employed locally, whether advancement lasts, and whether lower-wage positions are improved or simply filled by other workers.
Explore the evidence — Worker earnings
Explore the evidence — Local economic activity
What the evidence tells us
The current model applies a 1.4 local economic multiplier. This means each additional dollar earned is assumed to support about $1.40 in total local economic activity—the worker’s original dollar plus approximately 40 cents in additional activity as spending circulates through local businesses and households. The model does not separately estimate what share of the original earnings remains within each county.
What to keep in mind
Actual recirculation will depend on where households spend, where businesses source goods and services, who owns local assets and companies, and how much spending flows off-island. The 1.4 multiplier is a planning assumption, not a measured county-specific retention rate.
Explore the evidence
What the evidence tells us
Workforce strategy can support diversification by strengthening existing Anchor industries while building pathways into promising sectors that expand a region’s mix of living-wage opportunities. Priorities should reflect regional assets, employer demand, STAR access, transferable skills, and the capacity to create durable destination jobs. Workforce investments should be coordinated with business growth, entrepreneurship, infrastructure, and economic-development efforts so training and job creation advance together.
What to keep in mind
Diversification should not mean pursuing industries solely because they are new or growing elsewhere. Regions should test whether local employers, occupations, wages, and advancement opportunities can support workers at meaningful scale.
Explore the evidence

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Frequently asked questions

Workforce Ecosystem FAQ

Hawaiʻi’s labor market

Does Hawaiʻi have enough living-wage opportunities for its workforce?

Why can employers struggle to hire while workers struggle to find good jobs?

Why does geography matter so much?

How does Honolulu’s opportunity landscape differ from the Neighbor Islands?

Is Hawaiʻi primarily facing a worker shortage, a job-quality problem, or both?

Underemployed or underserved populations

Who are STARs?

How much of Hawaiʻi’s workforce is Skilled Through Alternative Routes?

Are four-year-degree requirements excluding qualified workers?

Why are so many college graduates underemployed?

Why are many skilled workers still earning below a living wage?

What does “within reach of a living wage” actually mean?

Economic MObility

Which industries provide the strongest opportunities for STAR workers?

What do Anchor, Building, Partial, and Limited mean?

Why can the same industry be promising in one county and limited in another?

Is high hiring volume always a sign of good opportunity?

Which industries combine worker access with living-wage potential?

Are there enough destination jobs for people who complete training?

Moving workers into better opportunities

Does training alone lead to economic mobility?

Why do workers need navigation and coaching?

What makes work-based learning effective?

Should workers be paid while they learn?

What role should employers play in training and advancement?

Can incumbent-worker advancement be more effective than recruiting new workers?

When is skills-based hiring more important than additional training?

Hawaiʻi’s Generational Workforce Commitment

What is Hawaiʻi’s Generational Workforce Commitment?

What does Hawaiʻi’s Generational Workforce Commitment ask of us?

Why must workforce development and economic development move together?

What could sustained workforce investment accomplish?

What does the commitment ask of employers?

What does the commitment ask of educators and training providers?

What does the commitment ask of government?

What does the commitment ask of philanthropy?

What does the commitment ask of workforce intermediaries?

What does the commitment ask of workers and communities?

How should Hawaiʻi balance immediate returns with geographic equity?

How will Hawaiʻi know whether the commitment is working?

Potential Challenges

What happens when workers gain skills but there are no higher-paying jobs?

Can workforce development succeed without economic development?

What happens to the lower-wage jobs workers leave behind?

Does upward mobility reduce the living-wage gap or simply change who occupies low-wage jobs?

Can small counties support standalone workforce infrastructure?

How could higher worker earnings affect an island economy?

From Commitment to Implementaton

What should Hawaiʻi do first?

What should be coordinated statewide, and what should be led regionally?

Where should Hawaiʻi begin building or strengthening pathways?

What shared workforce infrastructure does Hawaiʻi need?

How should Hawaiʻi learn while it implements?

What data does Hawaiʻi still need?

What would a coordinated statewide workforce strategy look like?

FAQ by County

Hawaiʻi County

Does Hawaiʻi County have enough living-wage opportunities for its future workforce?

Why can Hawaiʻi County employers struggle to hire while residents still struggle to find good jobs?

What education or training do Hawaiʻi County’s living-wage jobs typically require?

Which occupation groups will generate the most living-wage openings in Hawaiʻi County?

Which industries offer the strongest mobility opportunities for STAR workers on Hawaiʻi Island?

Why is healthcare especially promising on Hawaiʻi Island?

How many Hawaiʻi Island workers are already close to reaching a living wage?

What could sustained workforce investment generate in local earnings and economic activity?

Does Hawaiʻi County need more training, more living-wage jobs, stronger job quality, or some combination?

What should Hawaiʻi County leaders verify before investing in a regional workforce pathway?

Honolulu County

Does Honolulu have enough living-wage opportunities for its future workforce?

Why can Honolulu have a large and diverse job market while many residents still struggle to find living-wage work?

What education or training do Honolulu’s living-wage jobs typically require?

Which occupation groups will generate the most living-wage openings in Honolulu?

Which industries offer the strongest mobility opportunities for STAR workers in Honolulu?

How many Honolulu workers are already close to reaching a living wage?

What could sustained workforce investment generate in additional earnings and local economic activity?

How can Honolulu’s larger labor market support multiple mobility pathways at the same time?

Which Honolulu workforce pathways are large enough to reach workers at meaningful scale?