Job growth slows, but construction still bests other areas

There were an estimated 6.74 million Americans employed by the construction industry in December — only 1 percent more than during the final month of 2000.

But although the total number of jobs in the nation's construction sector increased by only 7,000 between the final two months of 2001, and by a modest 66,000 over the past year, the industry's labor market remains much healthier than that of most of the other sectors of the economy.

Construction's mild annual job gain was in sharp contrast to the 7.2 percent loss of jobs recorded by the nation's manufacturing sector. Yet, far fewer new construction jobs were created during 2001 than in previous years. Annual expansion had averaged about 5 percent over the previous six years.

Specifically, December employment figures for general building contractors were about 1.55 million, a gain of 0.7 percent from 2000.

Specialty trade contracting firms in-creased their payrolls by 0.5 percent, or about 22,000 jobs over the same period. All told, total 2001 employment in the nonbuilding side of construction escalated by 3.9 percent, or an estimated 33,500 jobs.