Construction Employment Reaches Six-Year High
ByNetwork with your peers from across the country at RealShare national conferences. RealShare STUDENT HOUSING in Dallas on September 1-2. RealShare APARTMENTS in Los Angeles on October 21-22 andRealShare HEALTHCARE REAL ESTATE. Make your arrangements today!
“The industry could hire many more workers if they were available,” says AGC’s Ken Simonson.
DARLINGTON, VA—A pair of leading metrics for development—construction employment and forward momentum moved
upward in July. The Associated General Contractors of America said Friday that construction employment hit the highest level since February 2009, while unemployment in the sector hit a 14-year low. Looking ahead, Dodge Data & Analytics said Friday its Dodge Momentum Index, a monthly measure of the initial report for nonresidential building projects in planning, rose to 125.3 in July, up 5.4% from its June reading of 118.9.
Although AGC sees the July numbers as heartening, the association also highlights some underlying concerns. July’s increase brought employment to a six-year high of 6.383 million, but only 6,000 jobs were added during the month. That’s less than a third of the monthly average of 19,250 seen during the past year and a sign that hiring is slowing, especially since that monthly average tapered off over the past five months. And AGC once again pointed to a diminishing pool of available qualified labor…
