Construction employment added 32,000 jobs on net in July, according to www.abc.org. On a year-over-year basis, the industry has expanded by 311,000 jobs—an increase of 4.2%.
The construction unemployment rate fell from 3.7% in June to 3.5% in July. The national unemployment rate for all industries fell from 3.6% in June to 3.5% in July as the U.S. economy added 528,000 jobs.
Nonresidential construction added 18,300 jobs in July, with all three subsectors showing growth. Nonresidential specialty trade contractors added 10,300 jobs; nonresidential building added 4,900 jobs; and heavy and civil engineering added 3,100 jobs.
“Today’s employment report was expected to show an economy not yet in recession but at least headed in that direction,” said Associated Builders and Contractors Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “Shockingly, that did not come to pass, as U.S. employers added 528,000 jobs in July, more than twice the consensus forecast of 250,000, and the unemployment rate across all industries fell to 3.5%, tied for the lowest rate since the late 1960s.
“Yes, the construction industry also added a healthy number of jobs in July, but the impact of macroeconomic deterioration is already apparent in other construction data,” Basu continued. “To date, the residential segment has felt the brunt of rising borrowing costs, with mortgage applications recently declining to multidecade lows. But ongoing weakness in certain commercial real estate segments, sky-high materials prices, and shortages of skilled construction workers have forestalled a growing number of projects by suppressing demand at a time when the cost of delivering construction services remains elevated. The industry’s labor supply remains severely constrained; the construction unemployment rate fell to 3.5% in July, the fifth lowest rate in the 22-plus years for which the Bureau of Labor Statistics has data.”
