Dive Brief:

• The latest federal report on jobs shows that builders and contractors put 19,000 more people on payrolls in March than they were paying in February, and that was enough to lower the unemployment rate, even though more people are looking for work now.
• Associated General Contractors touted the fact that construction employment – residential and non-residential – last month was 5,964,000, which was the largest number since June 2009.
• Associated Builders and Contractors broke down the gain as coming from 6,700 more people working in non-residential, 9,100 more in residential and 3,200 more in civil and heavy construction.

Dive Insight:

The construction industry unemployment rate went down to 11.3% without a seasonal adjustment, even though the overall unemployment rate in the U.S. stayed at the 6.7% it was at in February. While that is still above where it was in the second half of last year, winter seems to finally be going away, and AGC noted that construction employment has gone up 2.6% in the past year compared with the overall workforce gain of 1.7%.