flexiblefullpage -
billboard - default
interstitial1 - interstitial
catfish1 - bottom
Currently Reading

Construction industry adds 45,000 jobs in April

Building Team

Construction industry adds 45,000 jobs in April

The construction industry saw an increase in jobs during the month of April after losing approximately 9,000 positions in March.


By BD+C Staff | May 8, 2015
Construction industry adds 45,000 jobs in April

A new report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that the construction industry added 45,000 jobs in April. Image: Pixabay

A new report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that the U.S. construction industry added 45,000 jobs during the month of April. According to Associated Builders and Contractors, nonresidential construction employment rose by 12,400 jobs in April while nonresidential specialty trade contractors added 20,200 new jobs following a loss of 9,000 jobs in March.

 

 

The following is a breakdown of construction employment in April:

• Nonresidential building construction employment fell by 7,800 jobs for the month but is up by 16,600 jobs (2.4 percent) from the same time last year.

• The heavy and civil engineering construction segment added 8,400 jobs in April and employment is up by 33,100 positions (3.6 percent) year-over-year.

• Residential building construction employment expanded by 2,800 jobs in April and is up by 41,200 jobs (6.3 percent) on an annual basis.

• Residential specialty trade contractors added 20,800 net new jobs in April and has added 102,400 jobs (6.8 percent) since April 2014.

• Nonresidential specialty trade contractors added 20,200 jobs for the month and employment in that category is up by 76,400 jobs (3.5 percent) from the same time last year.

Mining and logging lost 15,000 net jobs in April after gaining jobs in every month during 2014. This sector lost more jobs during the first quarter of 2015 (-48,000) than it added in all of 2014.

“While the broader jobs report proved better than expected, April was the best month for construction employment since January 2014,” said Associated Builders and Contractors Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “Though it may have been expected to see solid job creation performance reflected in today’s report, it is still a relief to obtain a nice piece of data. Economic data regarding retail sales, industrial production, and other elements of economic life have largely been disappointing to date and the March jobs report fell in line with that series of uninspired results. Data regarding unemployment claims strongly suggested that employers viewed the recent bout of economic weakness as temporary. The lack of new lay-off activity indicates an ongoing demand for labor and April’s reasonably strong employment gains suggest that many employers continue to search for additional staffing."

Related Stories

| Aug 11, 2010

Loft Condo Conversion That's Outside the Box

Few people would have taken a look at a century-old cigar box factory with crumbling masonry and rotted wood beams and envisioned stylish loft condos, but Miles Development Partners did just that. And they made that vision a reality at Box Factory Lofts in historic Ybor City, Fla. Once the largest cigar box plant in the world, the Tampa Box Company produced boxes of many shapes and sizes, spec...

| Aug 11, 2010

Idea Center at Playhouse Square: A better idea

Through a unique partnership between a public media organization and a performing arts/education entity, a historic building in the heart of downtown Cleveland has been renovated as a model of sustainability and architectural innovation. Playhouse Square, which had been working for more than 30 years to revitalize the city's arts district, teamed up with ideastream, a newly formed media group t...

| Aug 11, 2010

Pioneer Courthouse: Shaking up the court

In the days when three-quarters of America was a wild, lawless no-man's land, Pioneer Courthouse in Portland, Ore., stood out as a symbol of justice and national unity. The oldest surviving federal structure in the Pacific Northwest and the second-oldest courthouse west of the Mississippi, Pioneer Courthouse was designed in 1875 by Alfred Mullett, the Supervising Architect of the Treasury.

| Aug 11, 2010

Divine intervention

Designed by H. H. Richardson in the 1870s to serve the city's burgeoning Back Bay neighborhood, Trinity Church in the City of Boston would come to represent the essence of the Richardsonian Romanesque style, with its clay tile roof, abundant use of polychromy, rough-faced stone, heavy arches, and massive size.

| Aug 11, 2010

Westin Hotel

Mid-twentieth-century projects are in a state of limbo. In many cities, safeguards against quick demolition don't even cover “new” buildings built after 1939, yet many such buildings may be obsolete by current standards. The Farmers and Mechanics Savings Bank, located in downtown Minneapolis, was one such building, a rare example of architecture from a time when American design was ...

| Aug 11, 2010

Dream Fields, Lone Star Style

How important are athletic programs to U.S. school districts? Here's one leading indicator: In 2005, the National Football League sold 17 million tickets. That same year, America's high schools sold an estimated 225 million tickets to football games, according to the American Football Coaches Association.

| Aug 11, 2010

Platinum Award: Monumentally Hip Hotel Conversion

At one time the tallest building west of the Mississippi, the Foshay Tower has stood proudly on the Minneapolis skyline since 1929. Built by Wilbur Foshay as a tribute to the Washington Monument, the 30-story obelisk served as an office building—and cultural icon—for more than 70 years before the Ryan Companies and co-developer RWB Holdings partnered with Starwood Hotels & Resor...

| Aug 11, 2010

Living and Learning Center, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences

From its humble beginnings as a tiny pharmaceutical college founded by 14 Boston pharmacists, the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences has grown to become the largest school of its kind in the U.S. For more than 175 years, MCPHS operated solely in Boston, on a quaint, 2,500-student campus in the heart of the city's famed Longwood Medical and Academic Area.

| Aug 11, 2010

Gold Award: Eisenhower Theater, Washington, D.C.

The Eisenhower Theater in the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., opened in 1971. By the turn of the century, after three-plus decades of heavy use, the 1,142-seat box-within-a-box playhouse on the Potomac was starting to show its age. Poor lighting and tired, worn finishes created a gloomy atmosphere.

| Aug 11, 2010

Giants 300 University Report

University construction spending is 13% higher than a year ago—mostly for residence halls and infrastructure on public campuses—and is expected to slip less than 5% over the next two years. However, the value of starts dropped about 10% in recent months and will not return to the 2007–08 peak for about two years.

boombox1 - default
boombox2 -
native1 -

More In Category



Giants 400

Top 75 Engineering Firms for 2023

Kimley-Horn, WSP, Tetra Tech, Langan, and IMEG head the rankings of the nation's largest engineering firms for nonresidential buildings and multifamily buildings work, as reported in Building Design+Construction's 2023 Giants 400 Report.


halfpage1 -

Most Popular Content

  1. 2021 Giants 400 Report
  2. Top 150 Architecture Firms for 2019
  3. 13 projects that represent the future of affordable housing
  4. Sagrada Familia completion date pushed back due to coronavirus
  5. Top 160 Architecture Firms 2021