Construction Economic News

The U.S. total number of jobs count rose by more than half a million in January, according to the latest Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The climb in employment of +517,000 positions was double the increase in the preceding month of December.

Graph 1 below shows the moderation in construction material costs that has been taking place. There’s about a 50-50 split between items with year-over-year price increases versus those with y/y declines.

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 United States for November 2022.

Megaprojects are 2022’s Story of the Year ConstructConnect announced today that December 2022’s volume of construction starts, excluding residential work, was $50.1 billion, an increase of +58.1% compared with November’s figure of $31.7 billion (originally reported as $31.1 billion). After a relatively quiet month for megaproject starts (i.e., those of a billion dollars or more each) in November, they came roaring back in the latest month.

Fighting through the headwinds of more restrictive interest rates, the U.S. economy managed another good month of jobs creation in December, +223,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It should be noted, however, that the month-to-month increase in nationwide employment has been gradually diminishing over the past six months.

Given the increases in mortgage rates that have transpired, significant slides in homebuilding activity are being taken for granted in the United States and Canada. Based on the latest housing starts statistics, this is already underway and clearly apparent in the former more than in the latter. See Graph 8 below, where Canadian housing starts have been moving mostly sideways throughout this year, while U.S. starts have been exhibiting significant declines month to month.

Canada has become much more than a natural resource-based economy.

Megaprojects Take a Back Seat in November ConstructConnect announced today that November 2022’s volume of construction starts, excluding residential work, was $31.1 billion, a decline of -36.3% compared with October’s figure of $48.9 billion (originally reported as $47.5 billion; the difference coming mainly in the multi-unit residential subcategory of starts).

The accompanying table records the top 10 project starts in the United States for November 2022.