“Employment in the overall construction sector declined by 20,000 in May, following a revised decrease of 5,000 jobs in April. This month’s decrease in construction employment reflected a job loss in nonresidential specialty trade contractors (-16,800). Residential construction added 1,900 jobs in May, after a revised decrease of 10,100 jobs in April.
Residential construction employment now stands at 3.0 million in May, broken down as 872,000 builders and 2.1 million residential specialty trade contractors. The 6-month moving average of job gains for residential construction was 7,917 a month. Over the last 12 months, home builders and remodelers added 271,700 jobs on a net basis. Since the low point following the Great Recession, residential construction has gained 1,034,000 positions.
In May, the unemployment rate for construction workers rose to 7.4% on a seasonally adjusted basis. This was the first increase in the past thirteen months. The unemployment rate for construction workers has been trending lower, after reaching 14.1% in April 2020 due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
