March 31, 2012

State of Construction: The Best and Worst (Mostly Worst)

By Randall T. Perks
Let's take a look at national construction employment.  According to the latest available data (February, 2012) from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Construction Sector website, national construction employment peaked in April 2006 at 7,726,000 workers.  Today, construction employment stands at 5,554,000 workers.  Over the last six years, 2,172,000 construction jobs have been lost.  The decline is actually larger, given that the undocumented workforce is prevalent on construction jobsites but not in government records. Looking at the construction un-employment rate is a far more deceptive thing.  Beginning with a few definitions, let's take a look at the BLS national construction statistics.  As BLS defines it, "[t]he unemployment rate represents the number of unemployed as a percent of the labor force[,]" and "[t]he labor force is the sum of employed and unemployed persons." According to BLS, the national unemployment rate in the construction industry...(Read Full Article)