California in building boom
California, Inland Empire in building booms: 6 things to know
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Inland Empire construction firms added 12,200 jobs, or 14 percent growth, tops among major U.S. metro areas. Seen here, construction of the Riverside Community Hospital expansion in Riverside on April 27. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)
By JONATHAN LANSNER | jlansner@scng.com | Orange County Register
PUBLISHED: May 2, 2017 at 10:49 am | UPDATED: May 2, 2017 at 11:59 am
The Inland Empire is the nation’s regional construction hot spot, at least when it comes to one tally of employment.
And that same math ranks California best for building work among the states.
Here are six things we learned from the slicing and dicing of recent jobs reports by the Associated General Contractors of America and how March looks vs. a year earlier:
1. Inland Empire construction firms added 12,200 jobs, or 14 percent growth, tops among major U.S. metro areas.
Riverside and San Bernardino counties were followed by Atlanta (up 9,400 jobs, or 8 percent); Tampa-St. Petersburg (up 8,600 jobs, or 13 percent); Portland (up 6,300 jobs, or 11 percent) and Dallas (up 6,000 jobs, 5 percent).
2. The rest of Southern California was busy, too. Orange County added 5,000 workers or 5 percent. Los Angeles County was up 4,900 jobs or 4 percent. The four-county addition of 22,100 construction workers is roughly equal to the entire building industry’s employment in Detroit or Albuquerque or Tulsa.
3. Construction employment was up in 224 out of 358 metro areas tracked in the past year. Biggest losers were Pittsburgh (down 2,900 jobs, or 6 percent); Boston (down 2,300 jobs, or 4 percent); and Middlesex, N.J. (down 2,100 jobs, or 6 percent.)
4. As for the states, California was No. 1 adding 42,200 construction jobs, or 5.5 percent, in a year. Next was Florida (up 36,500 jobs, or 7.9 percent); Texas (up 18,900 jobs, or 2.7 percent); and Washington (up 12,200 jobs, or 6.7 percent).
5. California led 39 states with rising construction employment. Among the decliners were: Illinois (off 4,900 jobs, or 2.2 percent); Mississippi (off 4,800 jobs, or 10.4 percent) and Iowa (off 2,000 jobs, or 2.4 percent.)
6. The contractor trade group also noted that nationwide construction spending in March was at a record $1.218 trillion annual pace and is up 4.9 percent for the first three months of this year vs. 2016.
http://www.ocregister.com/2017/05/02...hings-to-know/