Women in construction seek change

/in , /by

Originally posted on www.nwaonline.com

Advocacy group Lean In helps overcome harassment, discrimination on job

 

NEW YORK — Bethany Mayer didn’t want to go back to work after learning that a fellow iron worker insinuated that women like her didn’t belong there.

Jordyn Bieker, an apprentice sheet metal worker in Denver, said she felt uncomfortable that her foreman asked her pointed questions about being gay.

Yunmy Carroll, a veteran steamfitter, said a worker at a training session declared that women in construction are “whores.”

The three women told their stories over Zoom during a Lean In Circle for Tradeswomen, one of 76 opened nationwide and in Canada this year by the North America’s Building Trades Unions and Lean In, the women’s advocacy group started by Facebook’s chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg.

About 700 tradeswomen are participating the program, designed to help them navigate persistent bias and harassment on construction sites, from unwanted sexual advances to being assigned lesser duties like traffic control or fire watch.
ADVERTISING

It’s a culture that industry leaders are fighting to change in the hopes of recruiting more women into a sector with an aging workforce that faces chronic labor shortages.

As spending on infrastructure rises, construction firms will need to hire at least 430,000 new skilled laborers in 2021, according to an analysis of federal data by the Associated Builders and Contractors.

Right now, only 4% of construction laborers in the U.S. are women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“We are really only employing from half the workforce,” said Brian Turmail, the Associated General Contractors of America’s vice president of public affairs, who also spearheads workforce development. “We are struggling with labor shortages with one hand tied behind our back.”

This comes at a time when the pandemic has exacted a disproportionate toll on jobs where women dominate, like restaurant servers and cashiers. Nearly 2.5 million women lost jobs and stopped looking for work during the pandemic.

Meanwhile, much of the construction industry was deemed essential, sparing it from mass layoffs. For advocates, it is evidence that more women should aspire to construction careers, which start with paid apprenticeships and can lead to unionized jobs with middle-class wages.

The median salary for plumbers and electricians, for instance, is about $56,000 a year, with the top 10% of earners making $98,000. But only about 2% of plumbers and 3% of the country’s electricians are women.

“We see this all the time. When jobs are higher paid, when jobs have more security, when jobs have higher benefits, they often go to men,” said Sandberg, who partnered with North America’s Building Trades Unions to take her signature Lean In Circles program to tradeswomen after meeting Judaline Cassidy, a New York plumber and union leader who had formed a Lean In Circle on her own in 2017, and later discussed the idea with Liz Shuler, now president of the AFL-CIO.

Cassidy often recalls being told to go home and do the dishes when she first tried to join a union more than two decades ago. But her career also has been empowering, and her daughter, Carey Mercer, followed her into the trades.

“You’re always learning something every day. There’s always some kind of challenge that you might run into where you might need to do some math or think about it and take a second a look at it,” said Mercer, an apprentice sheet metal worker.

The good news is that gains already made by women appear to have held steady during the pandemic, in contrast to the recession that began in late 2007 and hit the industry hard.

The number of women employed in construction had reached a high of nearly 950,000 in 2007 before plummeting to a recession low of 711,000 in 2011, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It took nearly a decade for their numbers to recover, eventually reaching new highs of about 970,000 at the onset of the pandemic.

But this time, the ranks of women dipped just briefly in the spring of 2020 before continuing their rise — surpassing more than 1 million for the first time in history in April. The share of women employed in the industry also rose, reaching 13.2% in 2020, compared with 12.5% in 2016.

Since those figures include office roles, it not clear how much of those gains were made by skilled laborers. But the number of women who graduated from North America’s Building Trades Unions’ pre-apprenticeship programs has also increased, reaching an all-time high of 23% of graduates this year, said union Secretary-Treasurer Brent Booker.

Pre-apprenticeship programs targeting women and minorities have proliferated over the past decade, while several thousand women gather each year for North America’s Building Trades Unions’ 10-year-old conference for tradeswomen. In a sign of their growing influence, the Iron Workers Union became the first construction union to adopt paid maternity leave in 2017.

The most uphill challenge is changing cultural attitudes in the field.

Kelly Kupcak, executive director of Oregon Tradeswomen, said she recently got a call from an apprentice plumber whose foreman, using racial slurs, said he didn’t care if she was Black or Hispanic because he just didn’t like that she was a woman. That was a year after Kupcak galvanized local unions and contractors to start anti-discrimination efforts after another apprentice found a noose at a construction site.

More subtle slights also take their toll.

Mayer, the apprentice welder from the Cincinnati area, had been excited about a new job where a raising gang would erect the columns on a new site. But then she learned about the co-worker who said women shouldn’t be iron workers. And she was put on fire watch for weeks.

“I don’t even want to go in tomorrow,” Mayer told her Lean In Circle, a group of six women who meet over Zoom once a month.

The women, at the May meeting and in later group texts, encouraged her to be direct and remind her foreman of her skills as a welder. By the time they met in July, Mayer had pushed for and gotten welding duties.

Patti Devlin, the circle leader, turned the July conversation to a perennial issue: constantly having to prove yourself in an industry where job sites change.

Veronica Leal, a Chicago painter who teaches an apprenticeship program, told the group that she has faced that problem for 27 years. At first, she said it was amusing to watch skeptical clients eventually lavish praise on her work.

But four years ago, she was irate when a client at an upscale apartment building told her she couldn’t possibly handle a difficult paper-hanging job because she was a woman, and closed the door in her face.

Leal’s supervisor told her to stay put while he called the client. Leal refused, telling her supervisor she would never work with that client.

“I just got so angry. I’ve been doing this for 24 years and I’m done proving myself,” Leal said.

The war for talent: How contractors battle for workers

/in , /by

By Robyn Griggs Lawrence | Originally posted on www.constructiondive.com

John Mingione, principal of New York City-based Omnibuild, has worn a lot of hats since he founded his construction management firm in 2003 — but never, until this year, has he needed a detective’s fedora. As Mingione doles out jobs to subcontractors because Omnibuild is short on workers, he’s keeping a close watch to ensure the subs can maintain adequate staffing.

“I keep my ear close to the ground, trying to spread the wealth around and not put too many eggs in one basket,” he said.

John Mingione
Permission granted by Omnibuild

In Los Angeles, Landmark Construction founder Ezra Laniado — also struggling to attract labor — is working on his poker face. He has found “the easiest way, which is the hardest way” to get and keep workers on his jobsites is to pay them more, but he has to be careful not to appear too desperate or they’ll ask for even higher wages.

“It’s a delicate balance,” he said. “We have to be very foxy.”

The construction industry’s inability to attract and retain talent, a major problem for more than a decade, has escalated into a full-blown crisis since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. With only 80% of the 1 million construction workers who lost their jobs at the start of lockdowns returning, according to CNN, Associated Builders and Contractors announced the industry needs to hire 430,000 workers this year and 1 million more over the next two years to keep pace with demand. Construction is competing for those workers with desperate companies from every other industry in a labor shortage Chamber of Commerce CEO Suzanne Clark called “a national economic emergency.”

Fighting for talent

Though exacerbated by the pandemic, the industry’s talent drain started long before anyone had heard of COVID-19. As contractors have been forced into ever-more creative methods of finding and holding onto workers, industry leaders have formed collectives to study and address the problem. With an aging workforce (the median age of construction workers is 41) and a monthly turnover rate of 5.2% compared with 3.6% over all industries, construction has some hurdles to overcome.

Branka Minic
Permission granted by Building Talent Foundation

“It’s a war for talent. It’s really bad out there,” said Branka Minic, CEO of Building Talent Foundation (BTF), a coalition of the nation’s largest residential building companies that advances education, training and career progression for young and underrepresented workers. “Everybody is screaming for people, not only in our industry. We need to fight for every person and be much more agile in our efforts.”

When Minic took the helm of BTF two years ago, she set out to align education and training programs with the industry’s needs and partner with organizations that can help BTF reach new populations, including schools, churches, foster care agencies and community groups ranging from veterans to Girl Scouts.

“We’re definitely diversifying the industry,” Minic said. “That’s one of our goals, obviously, to open new sources of talented people and make sure they have good opportunities.”

Higher wages

Paying higher salaries would appear to be the easiest way out of this crisis, but that becomes more expensive every day. The reservation wage, the lowest average wage Americans without college degrees will accept for new jobs, has increased by 26% over the past year, to $29.56, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. And this trend is far from over: a Willis Towers Watson survey found wage increases for production and manual labor workers rising from 2.5% this year to 2.8% in 2022.

Preferred Contractors Association Chief Marketing Officer Hadar Raz has seen construction companies raise salaries by as much as 10% in particularly hard-hit regions.

“All industries have common practices that work, and the construction industry has to first get to those,” Raz said. “A basic one is to start increasing salaries. That’s the first step.”

The next step, Raz said, is appealing to younger people by adopting worker-friendly practices common in other industries, including bonuses, flexible schedules and career training. “You can either give people a job or a career path. We need to show people this is a career and a profession, a trade they can always hold onto.”

What millennials want

Joe Flanagan, senior employment advisor at career matchmaker VelvetJobs, said more than 50% of millennials will remain in a job if they see potential career advancement, making training programs and reward systems a vital part of company structure. These programs, Flanagan said, “confirm to employees that they are valued for their contribution.”

Millennials won’t tolerate military-style hierarchies in which “the foreman is god and everyone does what he says,” said Carol Sigmond, a New York City-based partner in the construction practice group at law firm Greenspoon Marder. Younger workers are demanding a more collaborative approach, she said, “and it’s not so clear to me there’s not going to be some value in that.”

To attract younger workers, Sigmond said, contractors must stop treating construction as itinerate work. “The work is going to have to become steadier. The notion that people will work for nine months a year and spend three months sitting on a beach somewhere has to change. They can be training and prepping for the next year — but they must have steadier employment.”

“Construction, like any industry, pays people based on the value of the skills they bring to the table,” said Rolf Bax, chief human resources officer at career resource Resume.io. “It can be hard finding general laborers for sites because so many companies treat these people as disposable. If you make it known that people who want to learn new skills will be given an opportunity to do so, you will start to see more people applying.”

Attracting new workers

Younger workers are motivated less by money and more by what companies can do for them. They’re drawn to and stay with purpose-led companies with a human-centric approach, said Pat Wadors, chief talent officer at construction technology firm Procore Technologies and former senior vice president of LinkedIn’s Global Talent Organization.

Contractors need to get clear about their organizations’ purpose before creating what Wadors calls an “employee value proposition,” a promise to pay fair wages, treat everyone with respect and nurture an inclusive culture. “This creates clarity as you attract talent,” she said. “And employees will hold you accountable for that promise like never before.”

Allison Otto
Permission granted by Otto Construction

For Sacramento-based Otto Construction, that means focusing less on what skills people bring to the table and more on how their personality and work ethic would fit with the company’s culture of honesty, integrity and compassion. “Construction is great, but it’s not rocket science,” said CEO Allison Otto. “If you’re willing to learn and want to be part of our team, we’ll teach you how to do it. Our culture is so important. If we find someone who’s a good fit for it, we’ll mentor them and bring them up.”

“Culture is not something you can apply a dollar amount to — it’s not a health benefit,” said Laura Newbrough, human resources director at virtual design and construction company Zelus, which hires almost exclusively based on employee referrals and has a retention rate of more than 90%. “Culture is about leading and teaching and allowing people to learn on their own and try new things. It has always been the most important thing to me. I’m constantly checking in — how is the culture, how is the culture, what is a cultural threat?”

‘Lean In’ circles help women in construction to face prejudice

/in , /by

Originally Posted on www.compsmag.com

The three women shared their stories over Zoom during a Lean In Circle for Tradeswomen, one of 76 launched nationwide and in Canada this year by the North America’s Building Trades Unions and Lean In, the women’s advocacy group started by Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg. About 700 tradeswomen are participating the program, designed to help them navigate persistent bias and harassment on construction sites, from unwanted sexual advances to being assigned lesser duties like traffic control or fire watch.

Jordyn Bieker, an apprentice sheet metal worker in Denver, said she felt uncomfortable that her foreman asked her pointed questions about being gay. Yunmy Carroll, a veteran steamfitter, said a worker at a training session declared that women in construction are “whores.” It’s a culture industry leaders are fighting to change in the hopes of recruiting more women into a sector with an aging workforce that faces chronic labor shortages.
As spending on infrastructure rises, construction firms will need to hire at least 430,000 new skilled laborers in 2021, according to an analysis of federal data by the Associated Builders and Contractors. Right now, only 4% of construction laborers in the U.S. are women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“We are really only employing from half the workforce,” said Brian Turmail, the Associated General Contractors of America’s vice president of public affairs, who also spearheads workforce development. “We are struggling with labor shortages with one hand tied behind our back.” This comes at a time when the pandemic has exacted a disproportionate toll on jobs where women dominate, like restaurant servers and cashiers. Nearly 2.5 million women lost jobs and stopped looking for work during the pandemic. Meanwhile, much of the construction industry was deemed essential, sparing it from mass layoffs. For advocates, it is evidence that more women should aspire to construction careers, which start with paid apprenticeships and can lead to unionized jobs with middle-class wages.

The median salary for plumbers and electricians, for instance, is about $56,000 a year, with the top 10% of earners making $98,000. But only about 2% of plumbers and 3% of the country’s electricians are women. “We see this all the time. When jobs are higher paid, when jobs have more security, when jobs have higher benefits, they often go to men,” said Sandberg, who partnered with NABTU to bring her signature “Lean in Circles” program to tradeswomen after meeting Liz Shuler, now the president of the AFL-CIO, and Judaline Cassidy, a New York plumber and union leader who had formed a Lean In Circle on her own in 2017. The good news is that gains already made by women appear to have held steady during the pandemic, in contrast to the Great Recession that hit the industry hard.

Help wanted: 430,000 construction workers

/in , /by

By DAVID HELVESTON, President & CEO, ABC Pelican Chapter  |  Originally posted on www.bicmagazine.com

Construction companies need to hire 430,000 more workers in 2021 than they employed in 2020, according to an ABC analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

That jaw-dropping number could potentially grow to 1 million or more over the next two years to meet demand.

An ABC Pelican instructor helps a studentduring a hydroblasting course at the association’straining center.

ABC chapters across the country are working to supply the next generation of craft professionals with the tools they need to succeed and excel in the construction industry. America’s economic engine is fueled by a workforce equipped with durable and transferable skillsets, and ABC is providing the right tools to the construction workforce to cultivate long-lasting and rewarding career opportunities.

In Louisiana, the ABC Pelican Chapter will educate and upskill 2,000 new construction craft professionals by the end of this year. Through training centers in Baton Rouge and Lake Charles, we educate students in crafts such as welding, electrical, millwright, pipefitting, heavy equipment operation, instrumentation and more. Men and women of all ages come to ABC Pelican to learn a new craft or perfect their current one. ABC Pelican also has partnerships with local high schools that allow current students to begin craft training while still in school.

October is Careers in Construction Month, a national effort to educate the public about the opportunities available for a craft professional. Throughout the month, schools, contractors and other organizations will partner to host events that raise awareness and introduce students and young professionals to careers in construction. ABC Pelican is proud to partner with like-minded organizations such as Build Your Future, a nonprofit aiming to be the catalyst for recruiting the next generation of craft professionals, during Careers in Construction Month to encourage more young adults to consider career paths in the construction industry.

For 14 years, ABC Pelican has partnered with Build Your Future, Louisiana contractors, industry professionals, suppliers and other educational entities to host Build Your Future Day for current high school students across Louisiana so they can learn from industry professionals about the career opportunities available in the construction industry. We anticipate that more than 1,000 students from over 60 high schools across the state will learn about different construction career opportunities through handson demonstrations and conversations with industry leaders this year.

With the increasing need for more workers in the construction industry, I hope you and your business can participate in Careers in Construction Month to shed a positive light on and paint a realistic image of the construction industry. Reach out to your local high school, technical college or ABC chapter to see how you can get involved.

For more information, contact David Helveston at (225) 753-2590 or dhelveston@abcpelican.com.

Construction dented by inflation

/in , /by

By Jonathan Garber  | FOXBusiness  |  Originally posted on www.foxbusiness.com

Mounting inflationary pressures held back nonresidential construction spending in July, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data.

Nonresidential construction spending edged up 0.1% in July to $786.7 billion but was negative when adjusted for inflation. Spending fell on a monthly basis in six of 16 subcategories and was unchanged in three categories.

Total nonresidential spending was down 4.2% from the year prior.

“The nonresidential construction spending numbers are meaningfully worse than they initially appear,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu.

“Higher materials prices and worsening skills shortages represent primary culprits,” he added. “Many project owners are delaying projects due to elevated construction service delivery costs.”

Construction input prices were 23.1% higher in July than the year prior as the combination of a rebounding economy, supply chain disruptions caused by COVID-19, stimulus measures and labor shortages sent costs soaring.

Last month, prices for steel mill products shot up 10.8%, iron and steel prices climbed 7.8% and natural gas surged 13.5%. Those products have seen respective price increases of 108.6%, 89.2% and 146.7% over the past year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Prices for other input costs, including fabricated structural metal products and lumber, were also sharply higher compared with year-ago levels.

It remains to be seen how long the inflationary pressures may last.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at his Jackson Hole symposium speech last week said inflation at these levels is a “cause for concern” but reiterated the central bank’s belief that the current pressures are temporary. 

Powell signaled the Fed could begin tapering its asset purchase program before the end of this year but said rate hikes were further out on the horizon.

Fed fund futures traders at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange are fully pricing in the first rate hike to occur in January 2023.

Business groups call on congressional delegation to reject federal tax increases

/in , , /by

By ROI-NJ Staff (New Jersey)  |  Originally posted on www.roi-nj.com

Eleven N.J. employer groups and trade associations this week called on the state’s congressional delegation to reject increases to the federal corporate tax rate and the Global Intangible Low-Tax Income rate.

While the recently passed $1.2 billion infrastructure agreement included no broad-based tax increases on American businesses, the groups — in an open letter to the delegation — said the prospect of massive tax hikes remains on the table during reconciliation.

Such a move, the groups said, would be a crushing blow to many New Jersey businesses.

“If increased, the ability of workers and businesses across the Garden State to properly rebound from the pandemic could be severely hampered, with our competitiveness on the global stage impacted in the process,” they wrote. “Particularly considering that New Jersey’s tax rates are already among the very highest in the nation, potential hikes at the federal level are cause for concern.”

The following groups signed the letter:

  • African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey
  • Associated Builders and Contractors of New Jersey
  • Chamber of Commerce Southern New Jersey
  • Chemistry Council of New Jersey
  • Commerce and Industry Association of New Jersey
  • Statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey
  • Insurance Council of New Jersey
  • New Jersey Bankers Association
  • New Jersey Business & Industry Association
  • New Jersey Gasoline, C-Store, Automotive Association
  • New Jersey Chamber of Commerce

The letter reads as follows:

Dear Members of the New Jersey Congressional Delegation,

We are writing to affirm our shared commitment to delivering New Jersey’s economy out of this current turndown, and to urge your support in this endeavor.

We were encouraged to see that the $1.2 billion bipartisan infrastructure agreement included no tax increases on American businesses. However, discussions are still ongoing for a budget that would be passed through reconciliation — and we understand that the prospect of tax hikes remains on the table.

Specifically, some federal officials have proposed raising the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% and the Global Intangible Low-Tax Income rate from 10.5% to 21%. If increased, the ability of workers and businesses across the Garden State to properly rebound from the pandemic could be severely hampered, with our competitiveness on the global stage impacted in the process. Particularly considering that New Jersey’s tax rates are already among the very highest in the nation, potential hikes at the federal level are cause for concern.

We are wary of such tax increases and believe they would do more harm than good to New Jersey’s businesses and communities today. New Jersey experienced many lows during the pandemic, including reaching a record 16.2% unemployment rate during the peak of the pandemic and seeing about 30% of the state’s small businesses close their doors, according to some reports. There is clearly a long way to go in our recovery and we must do everything we can to support and boost economic revival in our communities.

But raising the corporate tax rate only serves to further set us back. Such a hike would affect businesses of all sizes, not just the big corporations. As we’ve seen before, tax hikes can ultimately fall onto the Main Street businesses and small shops that form the backbone of local economies across the state. A recent analysis by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce found that 1.4 million small businesses employing 13 million Americans would be forced to pay the higher rate.

And doubling the GILTI rate from 10.5% to 21% poses a host of additional challenges. A study by the National Association of Manufacturers found that up to 1 million jobs could be lost and nearly $20 billion in economic activity may be forfeited.

To protect our state’s economy and ensure a swift recovery, we urge your offices to avoid adding further tax burdens to our business community at this time.

Construction input prices up 23.1 percent from last year

/in , /by

Originally posted on www.cdrecycler.com

ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu says today’s input price increases can meaningfully affect contractor fortunes by trimming margins and delaying the onset of projects.

Construction input prices rose 0.6 percent in July, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Producer Price Index data released today. Nonresidential construction input prices increased 0.8 percent for the month.

Construction input prices are 23.1 percent higher than a year ago, while nonresidential construction input prices increased 23.4 percent over that span.

Energy prices continue to experience substantial year-over-year price increases. The price of natural gas is up 146.7 percent, while crude petroleum and unprocessed energy materials prices are up 102.9 percent and 93.8 percent, respectively. Prices for steel mill products increased 10.8 percent for the month and are up 108.6 percent for the year.

“One’s definition of transitory needs to evolve with these data,” says ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “While it is quite likely that there will be less inflation a year from now, a rebounding economy, ongoing supply chain disruptions and limited productive capacity have conspired to generate rapid price increases.

“Many economists insist that the current situation is merely temporary; still, today’s input price increases can meaningfully affect contractor fortunes by trimming margins and delaying the onset of projects.”

According to Basu, the good and bad news is that the economy is flush with liquidity.

“Injections of money supply by the Federal Reserve, which has yet to indicate when it will begin to moderate its quantitative easing program, have helped create large pools of investable money,” he says.

A significant fraction of that money is also being invested in real estate, which Basu says will often translates into construction projects. That is consistent with the stable-to-rising backlog observed in recent months as well as ongoing confidence among contractors, reflected in ABC’s Construction Backlog Indicator and Construction Confidence Index. However, Basu warns that liquidity also serves to help push prices higher.

“One can only conclude that the economy will continue to run hot into 2022 despite the malign impacts of the delta variant, producing both hefty advances in gross domestic product and unusually elevated inflation,” says Basu. “The fact that steel prices are rising is not only an indication of the recovery transpiring in goods-producing industries like construction and manufacturing, but also of the difficulty global suppliers are having keeping up with demand.

“That dynamic does not appear poised to change substantially in the very near-term, though there was some evidence of moderating inflation in the most recent Consumer Price Index report. Contractors should assiduously build contingencies into their contracts to protect themselves from additional materials price spikes. Given that construction firm services are in high demand, contractors should have enough negotiating leverage to accomplish that under most circumstances.”

Concrete and Cement Industries Brace for Demand Boom From $1 Trillion Infrastructure Plan

/in , /by

Originally posted on www.nbcmiami.com

Concrete is the foundation of just about everything. It’s used to construct buildings, highways, bridges, roads and more.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, concrete fell victim to the same phenomena impacting other essential materials and goods: snarled supply chains and labor shortages. And demand for concrete — and its essential ingredient, cement — appears to have only increased, after the Senate passed the $1 trillion infrastructure package to upgrade America’s roads, bridges and tunnels.

“In the short-term, we continue to have the supply chain difficulties, particularly in certain markets, and so prices are rising,” Anirban Basu, chief economist for the national construction industry trade association Associated Builders and Contractors, told CNBC. “So right now, apparently, supply is not rising up to meet demand.”

The industry also faces labor shortages of skilled workers and truck drivers. And the recent housing boom means more demand for concrete and cement, putting more pressure on the industry to increase capacity.

On top of all of this, there’s also a push to reduce the amount of carbon emissions that come from the industry. A study published by the National Academy of Sciences in 2019 estimates that global cement production accounts for 8% of global carbon emissions, making it the largest single industrial emitter of carbon dioxide.

Construction Industry Gains 11,000 Jobs in July as Jobless Rate Falls

/in , /by

Originally posted on www.enr.com

Construction’s unemployment rate dropped in July on a monthly and year-over-year basis to its lowest level in 17 months, as the industry added 11,000 jobs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported.

But the latest monthly BLS report on the nation’s employment picture, released on Aug. 6, also showed job losses in some parts of the industry’s nonresidential sector.

Construction’s unemployment rate for July declined to 6.1% from June’s 7.5%. Last month’s rate also improved sharply from the year-earlier level of 8.9%, BLS figures show.

July’s rate was the lowest since February 2020’s mark, the last month before the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Notably, construction’s July jobs increase followed  three months of downturns.

The residential building category recorded the strongest July jobs results, adding 8,300.

The nonresidential sector overall was up by 2,900 positions, but a gain of 7,500 in the nonresidential specialty trade contractors segment masked declines of 2,500 in nonresidential building and 2,100 in heavy and civil engineering construction.

For the 12 months ended July 31, construction overall added 224,000 jobs, an increase of 3.1%, BLS data indicate.

The bureau’s jobs figures are adjusted for seasonal differences, but its unemployment rates are not seasonally adjusted.

ABC, AGC Economists’ Analyses

Anirban Basu, Associated Builders and Contractors chief economist, traced the big upturn in nonresidential trade contractors to “considerable work underway” in upgrading existing facilities.

Basu said in a statement, “That helps explain why nonresidential specialty trade contractors added thousands of jobs last month while general [nonresidential] contractors did not.” ABC focuses on nonresidential construction.

He also pointed to liquidity in the economy as a key factor behind the recovery. Some of that capital is being invested in real estate, he said, “which translates into additional construction work.”

Still, Basu acknowledged, new construction remains “suppressed” in such segments as lodging and office buildings, due to dislocations from the pandemic.

The Associated General Contractors of America pointed out that total nonresidential construction employment is running far behind pre-pandemic levels.

Ken Simonson, AGC’s chief economist, said in a statement, “Contractors are plagued by soaring materials costs, long or uncertain delivery times and hesitancy by project owners to commit to construction.”

Simonson added, “Recovery has been especially slow in infrastructure construction,” noting that contractors in that category have regained only 37% of jobs lost in the pandemic.

Overall, the U.S. economy added 943,000 jobs in July, and the unemployment rate edged down to 5.4%, from June’s 5.9%.

ABC-Led Coalition Announces Six-Figure Advocacy Campaign

/in , , /by

Originally posted on gxcontractor.com

WASHINGTON—Build America Local, a coalition of construction industry and business organizations led by Associated Builders and Contractors, today announced a six-figure issue advocacy campaign aimed at educating Americans and members of the U.S. Senate about controversial government-mandated project labor agreements that reduce competition and increase costs for the construction of taxpayer-funded affordable housing, clean energy and infrastructure projects across America.

The campaign urges senators to oppose government-mandated PLA schemes as bipartisan infrastructure negotiations continue between a select group of Senate Republicans and Democrats and the Biden administration.

“As Congress works to craft infrastructure legislation, it is critical for the U.S. Senate to oppose government-mandated PLAs so all qualified contractors and construction workers have the ability to fairly compete and build America’s infrastructure,” said Ben Brubeck, ABC vice president of regulatory, labor and state affairs. “Ensuring fair and open competition on taxpayer-funded construction projects will ultimately result in savings to taxpayers, more opportunities for all qualified small businesses, minorities and women in the construction industry, and the construction of more quality infrastructure projects so America can Build Back Better and faster.”

When mandated by the federal government, PLAs exacerbate the U.S. construction industry’s skilled labor shortage, effectively prevent the 87.3% of the U.S. construction workforce that chooses not to join a labor union from fairly competing for contracts and drive up the cost of critical infrastructure projects by 12% to 20%, resulting in fewer construction projects and local jobs.

The Build America Local website houses a variety of educational and social media materials and also gives constituents access to a grassroots tool to tell their elected leaders to support local workers and businesses by opposing government-mandated PLAs in federal infrastructure legislation.

The Biden administration’s American Jobs Plan infrastructure outline encourages Congress to tie federal investment of taxpayer dollars in infrastructure to costly PLA requirements. Other Biden administration policies encourage state and local governments to mandate PLAs on infrastructure projects receiving federal dollars. It has been reported that the Biden administration is also working on an executive order encouraging the use of PLAs on federal contracts for construction services.

Controversial terms in typical government-mandated PLAs discourage competition from qualified union and nonunion contractors and result in a rigged bidding process that forces contractors to:

  • Use union hiring halls to obtain most or all workers instead of their existing workforce.
  • Obtain apprentices exclusively from union apprenticeship programs.
  • Follow inefficient union work rules.
  • Pay into union benefit and multi-employer pension plans that any limited number of nonunion employees permitted on the project will be unlikely to access unless they join a union and vest in these plans.
  • Require their existing workforce to accept union representation, pay union dues and/or join a union as a condition of employment on a PLA job site and receiving benefits, resulting in an estimated 20% hit to the paychecks of local craft professionals.