For Delaware to Grow, We Need Federal and State Permitting Reforms

Delaware’s economy is sending a warning signal that policymakers cannot ignore. According to the Delaware Department of Labor December 2025 Monthly Labor Review, the state’s unemployment rate was 5.2% in December, up from 3.6% a year earlier and higher than the national rate of 4.4%.

Those unemployment figures don’t tell the whole story. Other official data show a broader problem:

• Federal Reserve data show Delaware's Labor force participation rate has fallen to 59.4%, meaning more than four in 10 working-age residents are outside the labor force, not working and not looking for work.

  
  

• According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national labor force participation rate is 62.4%.

  
  

• If Delaware’s workforce participated at the same rate as the rest of the country, the unemployment rate would be closer to 10%—roughly 27,000 additional Delawareans who would be working or looking for work instead of being out of the labor force.

Those missing workers are a warning sign that the labor market is not working well for many Delawareans. How Delaware reviews and approves new projects is one of the tools the state can use to change that. Delaware’s leaders have begun to acknowledge the problem. In February 2026, Gov. Matt Meyer signed Executive Order 18, creating a “Permitting Accelerator” to coordinate agency reviews and fast-track housing, energy, and infrastructure projects.

The State is Already Acting

Executive Order 18 states plainly that timelines have “often stretched 18 to 24 months or longer, increasing project costs, discouraging private investment, constraining housing supply, and slowing delivery of essential infrastructure.”

The pressures behind the order are real:

• Delaware imports roughly three-fifths of its electricity from out-of-state suppliers, having retired significant generation capacity over the past two decades.

  
  

• The state’s Affordable Housing Task Force found a shortage of 45,000 housing units.