ConstructConnect Blog

U.S. Housing Starts Surprisingly Buoyant Year to Date One of the true economic surprises of the pandemic is how little sway it has been holding over housing starts.

Due to its complexity, much of the subject matter concerning the economy requires detailed editorial commentary, often supported by relevant tables and graphs.

Due to its complexity, much of the subject matter concerning the economy requires detailed editorial commentary, often supported by relevant tables and graphs.

The accompanying table records the 10 largest construction project starts in Canada in September 2020. Also included is the latest trend graph on starts. This looks at 12-month moving totals of the civil and nonresidential building categories in Canada.

The accompanying tables show the top 10 major upcoming Water Treatment Plant and Manufacturing & Warehousing construction projects in the U.S. They are all in the planning stage and are mainly new projects, but may also involve additions and/or alterations.

Canada’s Jobs Claw-Back Ratio Above Three-Quarters In September, the U.S. economy experienced a fourth month of slowing jobs increase. In other words, new jobs creation decelerated. North of the border, according to Statistics Canada, there was an improvement in hiring (or rehiring) in the latest month, versus the period before (+378,000 compared with +246,000), bringing a little more excitement to the recovery party (Graph 1).

The Presidential election is less than three weeks away and it will be hard to focus on much else between now and November 3rd. Just the same, proper attention needs to be paid to all the other happenings that are proceeding just off center stage. Some incredible statistical results are being racked up in the latest data releases from public and private bodies and the highlights are summarized in the next 13 bullet points.

Clichés are often true and it is the case that a picture can be worth a thousand words.

The accompanying table records the top 10 project starts in the U.S. for September 2020.

September 2020 Was Just Plain Weak ConstructConnect announced today that the latest month’s volume of construction starts, excluding residential work, was $24.3 billion (green shaded box, Table 4 below), a drop of one quarter (-24.8%) versus August's figure of $32.4 billion.