by Jonathan McGaha | 9 January 2013 12:00 am
The nation’s construction industry gained 30,000 jobs in December despite an overall increase in the industry unemployment rate, according to the Jan. 4 employment report by the U.S. Labor Department. That is the fastest pace of construction employment growth since February 2011.
Year over year, construction employment has risen by 18,000 jobs, or 0.3 percent. The construction unemployment rate for December was 13.5 percent (not seasonally adjusted)-up from 12.2 percent from November, but down from 16 percent the same time last year.
The nonresidential building construction sector added 7,000 jobs in December for a total of 12,200 jobs (1.9 percent) added during 2012. Nonresidential specialty trade contractors gained 5,600 jobs for the month, but have lost 25,000 jobs (1.2 percent) compared to one year ago.
The residential building sector added 5,800 jobs in December, but lost 6,600 jobs (1.2 percent) during the past 12 months. Residential specialty trade contractors added 12,300 jobs in December and have added 36,400 jobs (2.5 percent) since December 2011.
The heavy and civil engineering construction sector lost 700 jobs for the month, but has added 400 jobs during the course of the past year.
Across all industries, the nation added 155,000 jobs as the private sector expanded by 168,000 jobs and the public sector shrunk by 13,000 jobs. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ household survey, the national unemployment rate stood at 7.8 percent in December, the same rate as November’s revised data.
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