Article source: ConstructConnect

Midsummer 2020 will forever be known as a historic time for U.S. economic data releases. On this date, July 30th, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) has published its estimate of Q2 versus Q1 gross domestic product (GDP) change, annualized (i.e., extended for a full year), and it’s a searing drop of -32.9%.

Dealing with the coronavirus outbreak has exacted a terrible toll. Over the past four months, one-third of the U.S. labor force has been laid off, furloughed, or suffered drastic reductions in pay and hours worked. And now it’s been revealed that national output was cut by one-third from April-June versus January-March. Not to be forgotten, January-March 2020 relative to October-December 2019 was also in the red, -5.0%.

The most dramatic changes in GDP line items in the BEA’s ‘Advance Estimate’ report for Q2 2020 were as follows: ‘personal consumption expenditures,’ -34.6% q/q annualized; consumer expenditures on services, -43.5%; investment in nonresidential structures, -34.9%; investment in residential structures, -38.7%; exports of goods and services, -64.1%; imports of goods and services, -53.4%; and ‘final sales of domestic product,’ which omits the negative effects of the foreign trade shortfall, -29.3%.

From the investment figures above, it’s apparent that construction activity did not escape unscathed despite having the advantage of being judged ‘essential’ and allowed to proceed nearly everywhere in America, while other sectors were in lockdown.

(more…)

Article source: ConstructConnect

Article source: ConstructConnect

• Three Key Words: Congestion, Propensities and Mobility
• Residential Construction Outlook
• Nonresidential Building Construction Outlook
• Engineering Construction Outlook (scroll way down)
• Appendix A: ‘Starts’ versus ‘Put-in-place’ Statistics

U.S. put-in-place construction spending, during the coronavirus health crisis, has benefitted from the carryover of work begun last year. 2019 construction starts included an inordinately large number of mega projects valued at $1 billion or more each. There were 35 such projects last year, with a summed value near $80 billion, or 15% of nonresidential groundbreakings.

At the end of this piece is an appendix outlining the differences between ‘starts’ and ‘put-in-place’ statistics on construction activity.

ConstructConnect’s latest ‘put-in-place’ (PIP) forecasts are set out in the Table below and appear in a series of type-of-structure graphs. The graphs of ‘actuals’ and ‘forecasts’ also include Excel-generated trend lines.

Mostly, the trend lines capture only a loose approximation of how the data series moves over time. In a few instances, however, mainly among engineering sub-categories of work, there is a close relationship between ‘trend’ and ‘actuals/forecasts’. Those cases yield high R² values, a statistical term and calculation indicating close correlation.

(more…)

Article source: ConstructConnect

With today’s June Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the U.S. economy has now clawed back 29% of the total number of jobs lost in March and April, when shelter-at-home directives were first enacted to deal with the coronavirus outbreak.

February was the last month when the total employment picture in America was ‘normal’. Two months later, with April’s labor market statistics, the total number of jobs in the country was down by 20.5 million.

The percentage change in total employment from February to April was -13.5%.

While far from being rosy, the jobs numbers are perking up a bit. Staged re-openings in states are the reason.

Whereas nation-wide total employment was -20.5 million jobs in April versus February, it is now -14.6 million (again, versus February). And while the percentage change in total employment in April compared with February was -13.5%, it is currently -9.6%.

(more…)