Posts Tagged ‘Economy’
Monday, November 6th, 2023
Article source: ConstructConnect
The latest Employment Situation Report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics speaks of a +150,000 gain in the total number of U.S. jobs in October. That figure on its own is ho-hum. It is the second lowest monthly increase since pandemic days. (June of this year was weaker at +105,000).
The gain of +150,000 overstates the buoyancy. Versus the total jobs count of 156.874 million reported for September a month ago, October’s figure of 156.923 million was ahead by only +49,000 jobs. In the October report, September was revised down by -101,000 jobs.
The net result is that U.S. hiring is now as close to being flat as it has been in nearly three years.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Canada, ConstructConnect, Construction, Economy, employ, employment, Growth, interest rate, recovery
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Friday, September 3rd, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
August’s Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) says that the total number of jobs in the U.S. economy rose by +235,000 in the latest month. A gain of nearly a quarter of a million jobs may sound like a lot, but in the grand scheme of things, it’s rather tame.
Compare it with the month prior’s performance. July was originally reported at +943,000 jobs. That figure has now been revised higher to +1.053 million.
Job creation in August became bogged down. It was probably due to the coronavirus making a comeback, by way of the Delta variant, and threatening a fourth wave heading into the Fall.
The best illustration of how hiring tapped out in August can be found in the ‘leisure and hospitality’ sector. The economy-wide staffing change with bars and restaurants and hotels/motels in the latest month was zero.
Nevertheless, it’s encouraging to note that the year over year change in ‘leisure and hospitality’ employment is a strong +17.4%.
Total employment is now +4.3% y/y; construction employment is +2.7%.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Economist, Economy, employ, employment, jobless, jobs, Labor, market
Comments Off on Little Meat on the Bones of the August U.S. Jobs Report
Thursday, July 15th, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
A Compelling Megaproject Story
ConstructConnect announced today that June 2021’s volume of construction starts, excluding residential work, was $38.4 billion (green shaded box, Table 8 below), an increase of +14.4% vs May 2021’s $33.6 billion (originally reported as $32.5 billion).
Compared with June 2020, the latest month’s dollar volume of total nonresidential starts was -4.3%. On a year-to-date basis (i.e., Jan-Jun 2021/Jan-Jun 2020), total nonresidential starts have been -10.9%.
View this information as an infographic
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Economic, Economist, Economy, employ, employment, Housing, interest rate, job, lumber, shareknowledge, steel, US
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Tuesday, July 6th, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
This article consists of seven cluster charts of four graphs each, showing monthly employment levels over the past 20-plus years in 28 sub-sectors of the U.S. economy.
In every sub-sector, there were pandemic-related downturns in jobs counts in the Spring of last year. Nevertheless, it’s easy to see where jobs growth is on a long-term upward path, not to be deterred by a temporary setback.
On the flip side, there are industries where jobs prospects are clearly flagging.
The types of jobs covered are based in: resources; manufacturing; logistics and environmental; desk work (i.e., office-based); institutional (schools and hospitals) and real estate; accommodation, hospitality and entertainment; and ‘new wave’ (security services, couriers, pharma and software publishing).
There are text boxes accompanying each cluster which set out the highlights from the four workplaces featured. But there are some further observations to be made.
In the ‘Resources’ cluster, none of the four sub-sectors is showing a trend towards long-term jobs growth. Rather, the opposite appears to be the case.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Economy, employment, Growth, Hospitality & Entertainment, Institutional, job, jobless, jobs, Logistics & Environmental, manufacturing, market, New Wave, Office-based
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Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
The ten graphs in this article update the latest housing starts information for the U.S. and Canada through May 2021. Both countries are currently experiencing new home building booms. Super low mortgage and secondary-financing interest rates, a build-up of savings while being locked down during the pandemic and the pronounced shift to working from home and escaping from crowded downtown cores have been some of the major contributors to the uptick in new accommodation demand.
U.S. housing ‘starts’ appear to have settled in around 1.6 million units per month, seasonally adjusted and annualized (SAAR). The Canadian monthly average seems to be about 270,000 units, although twice this year the number has risen much higher, 308,000 in January and 333,000 in March.
The case for saying the ‘boom’ has been stronger in Canada than in the U.S. can be made in simple fashion. Monthly average starts on a SAAR basis in the U.S. year to date (Jan-May 2021) are an impressive +22.5%. The comparable change for Canada, though, is an even more outstanding +48.3%.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Canada, ConstructConnect, Construction, Economy, Housing, US
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Friday, June 4th, 2021
Big Grin Greets Big Pickup in Youth Employment
In any pre-pandemic month, May’s U.S. total jobs count gain of +559,000 would have registered as outstanding. And I don’t want to belittle the achievement, especially since it soundly beats the previous month’s figure of +278,000.
But as can be seen from Graph 1, even a swing of plus more than half a million appears as only a blip in the context of the month-to-month movements over the past year and a quarter.
The seasonally adjusted (SA) unemployment rate in May improved to 5.8% from 6.1% in April. The not seasonally adjusted (NSA) unemployment rate downshifted to 5.5% from 5.7% the month previously.
Young people are finding employment once again. The SA unemployment rate for individuals aged 16 to 19 brightened to 9.5%. And yes, ‘brightened to 9.5%’ is appropriate wording given that a year ago the SA unemployment rate for those just under aged 20 was 30.7%.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Economic, Economist, Economy, employment, Growth, job, jobless, jobs, Labor, market
Comments Off on U.S. Half Million Jobs Increase in May still only Drop in Bucket
Thursday, June 3rd, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
The economic world is full of odd connections these days. A case in point is the tie-in between airline travel and the price of lumber.
How can visiting Aunt Pat in Topeka have anything to do with needing a loan to purchase a two-by-four?
Graph 1 conveys very good news. U.S. airline passenger traffic, as measured by Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checkpoint numbers, is solidly on the rebound.
Over the latest 14 days ending June 1st, the number of people taking to the air has been 70% of what it was during the same time frame in 2019. While that still leaves considerable room for improvement, consider that for the same 14 days last year, the comparison with 2019 yielded a percentage level of just 12%.
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Tags: airline, Alex Carrick, construct connet, ConstructConnect, Construction, Construction industry, Economist, Economy, lumber
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Thursday, May 27th, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
Initial Jobless Claims and UI on Right Track
This article features a quick overview of the latest key statistics for the U.S. and Canadian economies, presented mainly in graph form.
For starters, U.S. initial jobless claims have finally dropped to a reasonable level, just above 400,000 for the week ending May 22nd. Prior to the pandemic, with the economy chugging along near full speed, initial jobless claims consistently sat between 200,000 and 300,000.
Therefore, once they fall below 300,000 again, there’ll be good reason to believe that a true return to ‘normal’ has been achieved.
The number of individuals receiving unemployment insurance is also trending down in a positive way. The latest weekly figure was 3.642 million, a falloff of nearly -100,000. In the best of times, the number is shy of two million.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Building Material, Canada, ConstructConnect, Construction, Construction industry, Economist, Economy, Housing
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Wednesday, May 19th, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
In this, the latest mid-month Nuggets report, I’ll focus on three major and interlocking (or interdependent) economic indicators: retail sales, inflation and housing starts.
Retail Sales
My world of economic analysis is being rocked in unprecedented fashion. Maybe ‘shattered’ is the better word.
For example, I’m used to studying year-over-year percentage changes to gain an understanding of what is going on in certain segments of the economy. Retail sales is a perfect example. In current dollar terms (i.e., not adjusted for inflation), they used to range from flat as a lower boundary to maybe +7% y/y as an upper limit.
When the coronavirus first struck in the Spring of last year, retail sales plummeted, yielding double-digit percentage-change drops for ‘total’ and many shopkeeper sub-categories. Now, a year later, the rebound that’s underway is being vastly exaggerated by the comparison with 2020’s deeply distressed results. Looking at April 2021/April 2020, we’re dealing with ‘funhouse’ numbers on the upside.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, Economist, Economy, employment, Growth, Housing, inflation, job, jobs, Labor, retail
Comments Off on Mid-May Economic Nuggets Report with Focus on Retail Sales, Inflation and Housing Starts
Tuesday, May 4th, 2021
Article source: ConstructConnect
Below are the latest stock market results for key North American and international indices, all in standalone graphics form and as of closing April 30th.
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Tags: Alex Carrick, ConstructConnect, Construction, Construction industry, developers, Economist, Economy, Growth
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