The annual Greater Omaha Chamber meeting on Feb. 5 was, in some ways, bittersweet. Business and elected leaders celebrated the metro area’s business community, from giving out volunteer and service awards to a public proclamation of Carmen Tapio Day by the city.

“Whereas Carmen Tapio has proven that the success of a local enterprise and the elevation of its community are indistinguishably linked, providing a blueprint for how a business can scale while remaining deeply rooted in local soil,” said Omaha Mayor John Ewing. 

Tapio is CEO of North End Teleservices in North Omaha, and is a prominent leader for the area, having also served on the chamber board. 

But then came the harder-to-swallow part of the annual meeting: A presentation by Josh Wright, executive vice president of growth at Lightcast, a labor market consulting firm. Wright presented data about Omaha from a study conducted by Lightcast and marketing firm DCI.

“Omaha has some key advantages, real strengths, but no clear identity to prospective talent,” Wright said. “The region is losing young people, wages are lagging and early and mid-career workers don’t see job and advancement opportunities … This is a pivotal moment for Omaha, a pivotal moment for the state of Nebraska. The lack of young talent will stall your growth or vault you forward — if reversed.”

In some ways, Omaha isn’t alone, Wright said. There’s a demographic crisis across the country. Baby boomers are retiring, and there are fewer young workers to replace them as the birth and immigration rate stalls.

These trends were identified by the Greater Omaha Chamber roughly a decade ago, and sparked efforts then to invest in diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

“When Omaha and other regions start talking, and they talk more and more about brain gain, brain drain, ‘What do we do?’ Know that you’re not alone,” Wright said. “This is a national topic. Other states, other regions, are addressing it, and it is an all-out war for talent, for trying to attract people to your region, and also, most importantly, to retain them.”

Much of Lightcast and DCI’s data reiterated trends that have already been shared by analysts like Josie Schafer at the Center for Public Affairs Research at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. 

Wright said that Omaha attracts much of its talent from inside of Nebraska, while losing talent to other states. The metro is seeing an exodus of children, which implies that young families are leaving. Compared to Dallas, Denver, Kansas City, Minneapolis and Phoenix, Omaha ranks last for wages.

And in a perception survey, about 40% of respondents said they are likely to or want to leave Omaha in the next two years — including many early and mid-career professionals.

The good news is that Omaha continues to rank well for its cost of living, quality of schools and low crime rate. The metro is also a blank slate for marketing, with survey respondents not seeing the city as having any particular quality — not ideal, but better than a net-negative view, Wright said.

“Omaha’s biggest barrier is not performance, it’s perception,” he said. “I’ve heard it since from multiple people. It’s like, ‘Oh, once we get people here, then we’re good.’”

Business and elected leaders need to be aligned on the data, issues and solutions, Wright said. “It’s super critical for Omaha to showcase career pathway opportunities, for you all to share inside your companies, to the individuals inside the region, for people to understand what’s possible.”

Down but not out

Wright’s presentation is no surprise. The metro area has been hit with several reports over the past few months showing brain drain and job and wage stagnation. Leaders worry that over the long term, that’s a recipe for decline in Omaha and Nebraska.

Those reports were top of mind even as business and elected leaders rallied attendees. They projected opportunity and hope for Nebraska, emphasizing that Omaha’s business community has a key role in revitalizing the region.

“We have work to do here, and I want to say, we at the chamber, we’re going to work together with everyone — with our local (leaders), with our state, to make us better,” said new Omaha Chamber Board Chair Paul West. “That means we need job growth. We need labor growth. And we’re going to need all of you and your help.”

West, a managing partner at financial services firm Carson Wealth, referenced his workplace as a success story that Omaha should be proud of and try to replicate. 

“When I started (at Carson Wealth) in 2012, we had 36 employees,” West said. “We have over 600 today. That’s 600 people … that buy cars. That (go to) the bank. That’s people that go out to dinner, that’s people that now have a multigenerational impact on our city.”

West described the chamber’s priorities in 2026, which range from increasing member engagement to business growth and working on policy. One of those policies was touted by Gov. Jim Pillen: The “Grow the Good Life tax incentive,” which would give companies a 10% tax credit for bringing workers from out of state to high-paying jobs in Nebraska.

“We all agree it’s the people of Nebraska that makes this place so special,” Pillen told the crowd. “We just have one problem. We need way more people.”

Pillen told Omaha’s business community that he values the metro and its growth, which also helps Greater Nebraska.

“Water in Nebraska runs from west to east. The economy, money, runs from the east to the west,” Pillen said. “I understood at a very young age: money came from Omaha and it went west. And the better the water flows, the more there’s here in Omaha, and it’s better for everybody in the state of Nebraska. I hope that makes sense.”

At the end of the annual meeting, Ewing, together with chamber CEO Heath Mello, announced a new brain gain effort for the city. Ewing intends to bring together all corners of Omaha’s business, philanthropy, education and government worlds.

“This initiative will be led by a task force co-chaired by the Mayor’s Office, the Greater Omaha Chamber and private sector leadership with accountability, data and real action behind it,” Ewing said. “In the weeks ahead, we will be calling on our community to shape the agenda and build the movement together.”

Ewing asked all annual meeting attendees to stand up and help him cheerlead for the city. On the count of three, the event hall at the CHI Health Center reverberated with a chant of “We will win.”

Lev Gringauz is a Report for America corps member who writes about corporate innovation and workforce development for Silicon Prairie News.